>> president trump signs the $900 billion virus aid bill, but continues to push for $2000 checks. futures trade higher. europe is 24 hours into its vaccination campaign as the u.k. looks poised to approve astrazeneca's vaccine as early as this week. upside buyback program fails to produce shares and fears hit china's tech giants. welcome to "bloomberg: surveillance."

hordern inie jhor london. the last monday of the final trading week of 2020. the stoxx 600 in europe, up .6%. some european markets including the ftse 100 in the u.k. is closed today. it is technically the boxing bank holiday. s&p 500 futures, extending gains of .6%. all of this, the market is cheering the fact that the united states did sign the yield, 95 and 10 year basis points. money moving out of treasuries, yields coming up and weaker dollar this morning. screen number two, the pound trading 1.3547. range to break out of the bound, even though we had a trade agreement. many would say question remains.

there is a lot of negotiation that will be happening between the u.k. anti-e.u. into 2021, especially the services sector. the pound under pressure against the dollar. bitcoin, trading under 27,000. the big move was between christmas eve and sunday, when it rallied more than 20%, piercing 28,000. it is holding gains, 9%. alibaba, under pressure alongside other online companies in china as antitrust fears are triggering another selloff. on thursday, alibaba new york fell 13%. is this just going to be for is the's empire or contagion going to spread across other assets when you look at chinese companies? we start with our top story out of the united states. president trump signs a $900 billion pandemic relief bill. demandsdown from last

it includes one point $4 trillion to fund federal agencies through september. trumpsigning the bill, demanded a vote in congress to increase to $2000. bruce einhorn, thank you so much for joining us. ago, trump week called the bill a disgrace but now, he's signing it. what has changed since then? bruce: nothing has changed in the bill. the same bill is the one he's pointeded, so as you out, he's issued a statement saying he's demanding congress make all sorts of changes, that they get rid of a lot of spending that he wants rescinded, but that is not the way the process works. he signs the bill, it is now a lot.

he can ask congress to make changes and they can ignore him and democrats in the house will do that. annmarie: what is congress going to do now that he has signed it? it is not realistic to think the stimulus checks will get a boost, is it? it seems that is not going to work with the republicans. bruce: you are right. the republicans generally are opposed to that, even though president trump has called for it. you are going to have a situation where the democrats, led by nancy pelosi, will reconvene, the democrats will addition of the relief die in0, then that will the senate because mitch putnnell doesn't want to his senators in a difficult position, especially given the runoff in georgia shortly after the holiday early in january,

where two republican senators are running and that will determine who controls the senate, and many republicans oppose this, it is an unpopular vote because many people want the additional money, so i think it is a good bet that mitch mcconnell will do his best to make sure there is no vote. annmarie: bruce einhorn, thank you for joining us. digging into what this means is the ceo of -- investment management. stimulus uncertainty is removed, painot before additional for americans banking on these payments. economicaterial to an point of view and feed into sentiment or our markets pass this? >> i would say markets are passed this. it is inconvenient, it is not great for the families who have missed out, but the important thing is the package overall has been passed.

is the nextat positive catalyst for 2021? supportget fresh fiscal with a new incoming biden administration or you going to hold off to see what plays out next week in the georgia runoff? lothar: that's exactly it. we will have to see what is really going to happen. georgia, the situation in the senate, what fiscal package the biden administration could put through, but for the moment, it is positive for the u.s. economy this has happened, this is in train and we have got that bridge over the next part of the pandemic until we get to the reliefccine and driven in the next months, not weeks, unfortunately. in 2020 one, more people getting vaccines, more

fiscal report -- support, do you see inflationary pressures starting to build into the new year? lothar: mild, and probably very much just in very certain areas, but not generally. deflationarye environment where the demand isn't outstripping the supply, only in very specific areas, so inflation shouldn't really be the issue initially. maybe in the second half. that is what we are more worried about, central banks may lose their resolve to be there with their monetary support to back up the fiscal support coming from the government. fed,rie: do you think the if we see that to the back of 2021, does the fed hold its nerve? lothar: i should think the fed nerve.ld its i'm not sure about other central banks, if inflationary pressures are deemed to be coming through, really too concerned

about inflationary pressures at the moment. something coming through. in the last decade, we had the issue of more supply rather than too much demand, so it would be a nice change. note --r note, you talkur about the outlook for 2021 and you say the grand canyon is above you, on everest, it is below your. , i don't think anyone's outlook for 2020 held up. are we in a grand canyon kind of moment or an everest moment? lothar: in between. muchnk it is pretty consensus that 2021 be better than 2020. it has just got to be. there is not doubt about that, but how good it will be is the question. back, aret bouncing

we seeing something similar to last summer or are we getting a more sustained recovery and that is going to be driven by whether the fiscal support can hold out onh things coming through the monetary side is really going to be the big question forgetd also, let's not the private demand. is housing going to hold up as people expect? are people going to make that change after having spent so much time at home during lockup? the post-pandemic world may not look so normal to the prepended mcworld. lothar montel of tatton investment management stays with us. let's get your first word news. the united kingdom and european union have signed a post-brexit trade deal but speaking to the sunday telegraph, boris johnson admits it doesn't go as far as he wanted on financial services. firmsis little clarity on

selling their equipment into the eu market. the empire of jack ma is facing pressure from china. regulators are telling his financial firm aunt group to go back to its roots as a provider of payment services, threatening to throttle growth and its business of wealth management and is creating a special team to set up a timeline for the overhaul. sales have risen 3%, driven by a boom in online shopping. according to mastercard, it is better than the results in 2008, which saw 3.5% drop. online sales rose 49% from a year earlier. e-commerce accounts for 1/5 of all dollars spent during the holiday season. global news 24 hours a day, on-air and quicktake by bloomberg, powered by more than 2700 journalists and analysts in .ore than 120 countries

coming up, the eu begins its vaccination program while it is poised to approve another vaccine shot. this is bloomberg. ♪ save hundreds on your wireless bill without even leaving your house. just keep your phone and switch to xfinity mobile. you can get it by ordering a free sim card online. once you activate, you'll only have to pay for the data you need starting at just $15 a month. there are no term contracts, no activation fees, and no credit check on the first two lines. get a $50 prepaid card when you switch. nationwide 5g is now included. switch and save hundreds. xfinity mobile.

annmarie: economics, finance, and politics. this is "bloomberg: surveillance ." i am annmarie hordern in london. the european union has become a -- they get the vaccination campaign. it will take months to vaccinate enough people to have an impact on the spread of the disease. the european commission president will be a gradual process and caution is needed. this comes as the u.k. is poised to approve the covid-19 vaccine

produced by astrazeneca and the university of oxford. the regulator could clear the shop for use this week so lothar montel of tatton investment management stays with us. 2021 with the u.k. getting the astrazeneca vaccine would be good for a lot of places around the world considering it doesn't involve as much as the logistic problems of refrigeration as the others. with europe finally starting to vaccinate, is there risk to the upside when you look at european assets? is now a time you would want to buy european assets? brexit plus vaccinations, is this positive? is positive and should be positive for the economy but let's not forget market had anticipated much of this happening and priced it in along the way, and we obviously as investors have not got such a bad 2020 so much as the rest of

the economy so i'm afraid, i wouldn't want to be out of the markets, but i'm not getting super excited about what may be on the upside. given how badly the u.k. suffered from covid and the scenes from dover, giving a glimpse of what could have happened if there wasn't a good straight agreement, certainly a lot of people are saying this is a sigh of relief that something was done before december 31, but going into the negotiations into 2021, we don't know a lot about services, do you think the u.k. comes in with a weaker or the upper hand in this? lothar: i think the u.k. is coming into this with a weaker hand because obviously, the economy has suffered more, we are more dependent on the recovery. benefit't been able to from the manufacturing upswing

because we haven't got that much manufacturing so services is very important. it is positive we are going into this with a deal rather than no deal. a deal is better than no deal, but let's not kid ourselves. it is a skinny deal. it doesn't do anything for services. we have to negotiate that and the city is not feeling particularly positive toward this at the moment. we are hopeful with a deal on trade, we should have a good platform to negotiate something on the services side and let's not forget the city of london, the financial center in london has a lot of mass, a lot of critical mass that is important for the rest of europe, as well, so i'm relatively optimistic on that side of the question. anticipate anyu market disruption next week as this transition period ends without much clarity on what is going to come next? lothar: no, not really.

we are also still expecting certain transition things to be extended, and with all the organizations in the city having expect it, anticipated worst-case scenario because we had to with our contingency planning, i do expect things to be relatively smooth. there may be a hitch up here and there, but it will not be the chaos you might have expected had things gone with no deal, at least at the borders. annmarie: this morning, the pound, 1.3555. it hasn't broken out, even though you have a skinny deal. is the fact there is no clarity or little on financial services what is holding back the pound from lien further? urther.ying fo lothar: i don't think so. the pound has priced in a deal

before we got one, so there is not much upside. all the rest is now this discrepancy of economic recovery between the u.k. and the rest of the world. we are lagging in that respect and currently there is not that material upside visible beyond what is priced in any way so it is back to the covid story, to the pandemic story and how much of a recovery we might get. annmarie: lothar montel of tatton investment management stays with us this morning. regulators in china ask aunt to overall its entire business taking aim at jack ma's empire. we discuss that next. this is bloomberg. ♪

9:22 in london. economics, finance, and politics. in formarie hordern francine lacqua. chinese regulators have ordered ant group to return to its roots as a provider of payment services and set up a special team to comply with demands. lulu chen joins us with more. a lot going on in asia's trading session. what is the pboc demanding and how will this affect its future ambitions? lulu: the central bank of china has told ant it needs to

understand the necessity of overhauling its business and everything from wealth management to credit lending and insurance and payments. our understanding is while the pboc said they may need to go back to its roots, it is not saying the company needs to stop operating those other businesses. what the regulator to has told ant is it needs to come up with to seesal and timetable how they can become more compliant with the regulatory measures and those separate business areas. withrie: this coincides what we saw last week, scrutiny of alibaba. how worried you think alibaba is about the latest and is facing from china? economics, finance, and politics. -- is facing unprecedented

challenges because the ipo was so high profile. it was supposed to be the world's largest ipo on the alibaba front, it owns a 30% stake in ant. facing itself is regulatory scrutiny from the anti-watchdog bureau. the company said it has been investigated by the anti-watchdog bureau as of last week. leaders came into the company cameuarters -- regulators into the company headquarters and took the research and andstigation on site concluded those investigations within the day according to local media reports and as of now, we are waiting to hear back from the company and regulators on what their conclusion is. annmarie: lulu chen, thank you for covering this through the morning. lothar montel of tatton investment management is still with us this morning. my question regarding this is,

what is going on with ant and alibaba. is that a red flag for investigators -- investors who are looking to china? lothar: not necessarily. it is not pleasant, but it was on the cards unforeseeable. i think investors do recognize that china is not quite the same as the west, so i wouldn't see it as a massive, huge red flag. i think we all saw this coming. ismarie: do you think this idiosyncratic to jack ma's empire or is there risk they will -- this will spread to other chinese companies? i think you will see the involvement of the state with other chinese companies when they do something that is not quite as expected by the chinese are liked by the chinese government and there are some positives in that, in that it can indicate real regulatory

we havet that perhaps been missing in some other stories over the last year, would wirecard have happened if the german regulator had a similar oversight regime as the chinese are displaying here at the moment? annmarie: our thanks to lothar montel for joining us from tatton investment management, ceo. happy holidays and happy new year. coming up, from tourism to green tech, why volkswagen is betting on a greek island to become the next big thing in electric vehicle development. we will speak to the deputy foreign minister of grace next. -- greece next. this is bloomberg. ♪

annmarie: economics, finance, and politics. 9:30 in london.

this is "bloomberg: surveillance ." .'m annmarie hordern it is the final trading week of the year and we are kicking off to the upside. beingoxx 600 is up .6%, led by cyclicals, chemicals chemicals, auto parts, all of this comes as we get a clearer picture on brexit and a clearer picture when it comes to u.s. aid, as donald trump signed the bill, s&p 500 up .6%. money leaving treasury market yields, up 95 basis points and the dax is up. there will be lighter volumes, but the dax hit an intraday record at one point and we trade north of 1% on the dax. all of this comes as president trump signed a bill containing $900 billion in pandemic relief.

the backdown from the president's demands avoids a government shutdown and delays to the supported aid package. the legislation, which passed congress last week, includes $1.4 trillion to fund federal agencies through september and called the bill, trump on congress to increased to millis checks to $2000, a nonbinding -- stimulus checks to $2000, a nonbinding request. larry summers told bloomberg raising the size of checks doesn't make sense. >> we are better off with stimulus them without stimulus. i don't think the $2000 checks make much sense. the real issue is going to be sustaining this expansion. 900think about it, the stimulus bill would pass $250 billion a month for the next three months. the level of compensation is

running about $30 billion a month below what we would have expected it would. gdp is running about $70 billion a month below what we would have expected it would, so in a way, it is quite unprecedented. we have stimulus already, much more than filling out a whole and given lots of the whole is from the fact not that people don't want to spend, but they can't spend, take a flight, or go to a restaurant. i don't necessarily think that the priority should be on promoting consumer spending beyond where we are now. i'm not even sure i'm so enthusiastic about the $600 checks, and i think taking them to $2000 would actually be a pretty serious mistake that would risk a temporary overheat. i would like to see more assistance to state and local governments.

i would like to see more money put into testing, more money put into accelerating vaccines, but gosh, david, i think it would be a real mistake to be going to $2000. larry summers, former treasury secretary speaking to bloomberg on stimulus and direct $2000 checks to david westin. toece is ramping up its bid become a leading european center for the development of electric vehicles. volkswagen, the world's biggest carmaker has launched a pilot project which could transform an island in the eastern aegean sea into a green mobility hub. greece has signed a memorandum of understanding with electric vehicle maker, and another with microsoft. joining us come the deputy foreign minister of greece. good morning. on the heels of these

investments from volkswagen and microsoft, massive names, can we expect other big names to invest in greece with such announcements? >> good morning to you. greece is becoming an investment destination for a number of big giants and corporations such as pfizer and microsoft and cisco and blackstone, and volkswagen, and next ego. we expect more as the political stability, the social cohesion, the economic recovery is taking place in greece and we look forward to materializing these amazing plans with volkswagen and more to follow. why this island? >> the program is made up of four pillars. one is the pillar that has to do with renewable energy sources,

-- resources, the island runs on diesel traditionally so we are converting that to a hybrid system that uses a son and wind and batteries and that will cover the entire island. it is about 1500 people. there is a certain living standard in the island. it is well represented in both winter and the summer residence in tourism, about 200,000 people a year. the second pillar is related to mobility so we are converting all the combustion engines into electric vehicles with the great support from the greek government and volkswagen. the third pillar is mobility of demand. 24 hours a day, people call for an electric van to pick them up and take them to wherever they want to go and finally, we are going to be providing infrastructure for autonomous mobility.

the island on the central aegean brings today the future. annmarie: what about the governments focus for renewables more broadly aside from projects on the edgy and island. lothar: -- kostas: about a year ago to shut country.plants in the all of them will shut down by the exception of one that will shut down in 2028 and we are supportive of green energy, the green deal and renewables of all wind, and evento offshore wind producing energy units. we are truly converting the country into one place where electricity in, electro-mobility , and renewable energy sources are going to play a role in the

development of the country. annmarie: is this due to the coronavirus pandemic? is that why there has been such a big shift into renewables? in 2021, what is the main focus of greek economic diplomacy? >> the pandemic has caused tremendous suffering to the economy, not only for greece but all over the world. it is an unprecedented situation we are into. the reason to change the frame of mind in how to conduct ourselves. we travel less, use more digital resources in doing business, contacting each other, maintaining social distancing, but also it has led to certain policymaking decisions in governments. hundreds ofan idea, applications of this rule -- digital transformation have happened faster than one would expect. -- of assistance to

materializing plants. as far as our economy is concerned, we look forward to the moment people would start traveling again and our tourism industry will grow as expected, but in the meantime, there are other sectors such as infrastructure and energy and renewables that we look forward to materializing. as energy is concerned, we have big plans that are materializing as we speak. greece becoming an energy hub in the region. we are putting together a floating storage and restoration unit in the northern part of the country and natural gas, a corridor to the northern andhbors such as bulgaria eventually romania and the rest of the balkans. the pipeline has been completed azerbaijan gas from to italy.

plans thatlenty of are being materialized as we speak and they create an investment opportunity for big players to take part in it. withrie: we see that volkswagen and microsoft and the prime minister said the volkswagen project is a vote of confidence in greece. we cannot forget the past. will grace totally recover from losses from its financial crisis -- greece totally recover from losses from its financial crisis? lothar: past is the past -- kostas: the past is the past and we look forward to the future. we look forward to public finances and boosting our competitiveness in the country. we've done that successfully. vaccinations started yesterday. we look forward to the moment when the pandemic will be passed. we expect tourism this coming season, this coming summer will regain part of its glorious past for the besthope

as far as the pandemic is concerned. annmarie: i think all of us do, and looking forward to traveling once again. deputyfragogiannis, foreign minister of grace, thank you for the exclusive interview on bloomberg television. let's get you the other news with our first word news. president trump has signed the 900 billion dollar relief bill passed by congress. he's backing down from the demand lawmakers change it. the president is calling to increase to $600 checks to $2000 but that is unlikely to pass. the is poised to approve vaccine produced by astrazeneca and the university of oxford. sources say the regulator could clear the shots for use early this week. the sunday telegraph reports it could be rolled out january 4. the u.k. has vaccinated more than 600,000 people using the vaccine from pfizer and beyond tech.

the european union has begun a vaccination campaign less than a week after clearing the shot by pfizer. they will take months to have an impact on the disease. ursula von der leyen and says it will be a gradual process and caution is needed. global news 24 hours a day, on-air and quicktake by bloomberg, powered by more than 2700 journalists and analysts in more than 120 countries stay with surveillance. the brexitome up, uncertainty. the trade agreement may have brought some relief, but the deal leaves major issues unresolved. the implications for the u.k. economy next. this is bloomberg. ♪

europe has been never, granting temporary equipment for u.k. clearing and is in no hurry with other financial services. annmarie: anna edwards breaking down brexit negotiations from finance to fish, the long-sought deal is raising questions across the board after four years of negotiations. leaders announced an agreement on christmas eve it leaves major issues on the table -- up in the air. joining us, lizzie burden. 'sat does it mean for the u.k. economic growth, considering the fact that there remains a number of questions we don't have answers to yet? >> his better than having no deal -- it is better than having no deal. a no deal scenario would have knocked off an extra 1.5% in 2021 mainly trading on the world trade organization would have meant head of client investment

strategy on many goods -- tariffs on many goods. the impacts will be softened by a 5% covid rebound in 2021. deal or no deal, there was always going to be more friction. the bank of england's andrew bailey put it, there is no such andg as a frictionless deal this is one example five the government's own estimate. 600,000 extra declarations are going to need to be filled out every day and that will take businesses time and money to organize. it could lead to food shortages at supermarkets and we had a preview of that with the chaos transporte shut down last week. bloomberg economics predicts overall, the new friction will

.5% lower than if they u.k. had stayed in the eu. annmarie: that is a lot more red tape and the whole point i believe of brexit was to get rid of the red tape and bureaucracy with the european union. the pound this morning, still in the range of 1.3548. could a weaker pound and up helping? it could help by making exports cheaper, but remember, the uncertainty of the past four and half years has meant sterling never really fully regained its initial losses in voteftermath of the brexit and that uncertainty has translated into weaker business investment which, in the u.k., has proved below the levels than the u.s., germany, and france and that is a problem that could , as studied by the

london school of economics, foreign investment into the u.k. could drop 37% after brexit. a weaker pound really isn't some evenof brexit panacea, though some have been calling for the currency to be artificially devalued to boost the economy next year. annmarie: quickly, where does this leave the boe? deal lessens the urgency for more emergency stimulus but economists say negative rates will be more likely to the strict lockdown measures continue past easter. members telling bloomberg it could be time for negative rates. a deal,ause we've got negative rates could still be on the table in 2021. annmarie: our thanks to bloomberg u.k. economy recorder -- reporter lizzy burden, who

was in dover last week on the scenes of the trucks mounting. wille rally and can use, it last -- continues, will it last? this is bloomberg. ♪

annmarie: welcome back. this is "bloomberg: surveillance ." i'm annmarie: in london. in 2010 was bitcoin less than one cent. breached $28,000 for the first time before pairing the advance. the digital core and more than tripled in price in 2020. the question into the new year, can the cryptocurrency sustain its rally or will we see a repeat of past bitcoin bubbles across assets -- that coin bubbles? our cross assets? reporter joins us. where do we see bitcoin prices going next? we have low volumes between christmas and new year's, yet christmas eve the sunday, a rose

over 20%, breaching the 28,000. can this last? bitcoinunny thing with andhere is no market open close for cryptocurrencies. it trades 24/7 somewhere. it really spiked over the holiday weekend. like thereobably, often is, discussion around dinner tables around it was ablecies and to top the 28,000 level. we love round numbers so the next level we are looking at is the 30,000 level, really astonishing thinking about from where we started at the beginning of the year. i talked to a source today who thinks we are looking at 30,000, likely might be a near-term top that might not see the same massive selloff we did when the bubble burst in 2017 so we are talking in the near term, drops

of 10% to 15% rather than a really big crash like we did before. annmarie: what are people saying about longer-term outlook? mike nolan gratz on twitter 5000, he it hits, will get a tattoo. is that likely? $5,000? keep talking about where is the top and it keeps punching through those highs. it is kind of uncharted territory we are in now and dangerous game to try to put a pin or number on it at this point. i'd point to a survey from deutsche bank. expectsurvey respondents bit -- bitcoin to behind a year, in the range of 20,000 under $50,000, so so that's a rough area of thinking. see if crossing

$100,000, which sounds high in the sky, but we are talking 30,000 now and that is relatively within your shot considering where we started the year at $3000. it suddenly doesn't sound so crazy. annmarie: what about other assets compared to bitcoin? manus calls bitcoin the millennial gold. in the summer, it did pretty well, 2100. how did bitcoin compare with other assets? it doesn't seem like other assets can keep up with the momentum gold has. eric: when you look at asset classes, there is not any good comparison to bitcoin. year, which5% this pales in comparison to bitcoin's almost 300% gain. looking for games like that, you are talking about individual stocks or speculative assets at that point so it has been a

monster year for bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. with the year winding down, we've seen it drop a little bit. there are still concerns about regulatory issues that are a constant worry for cryptocurrencies. longer-term, one of the big changes from 2017 till now is we ofe seen the start of entry the institutional investors and that has been a difference from 2017. annmarie: our thanks to cross asset reporter eric lam. that does it for me and "bloomberg: surveillance." guy johnson will continue the program. theave equities moving to upside, starting 2020 with a gain. that does it for me for 2020. see you next year. this is bloomberg. ♪

guy: stocks jump is trump signs the virus relief bill while a government shutdown has been avoided. by waiting until late sunday night, the president surprised 14 million americans with one week of unemployment aid. in terms of what is happening in europe, the focus is on vaccines. ofope, starting its rollout its vaccine program using the pfizer vaccine. there is an expectation that within the next few days, we could see an approval of the astrazeneca vaccine. that could have a big impact on the u.k. economy and in terms of what else we are watching, a focus on what is happening with the markets, alibaba shares under pressure in china. ant group told by authorities