♪ >> the world has basically kind of imploded because the pandemic. >> key sectors to our economy are damaged in ways that are going to take years to recover from. >> the long-term damage to the economy will gradually become apparent. >> once the vaccine has been rolled out in a meaningful way, then we really will start to see some very positive growth. >> the public still has money in reserve. >> you look at the price of some cryptocurrencies, certain parts of the equity market, there's clearly a bit of froth. >> this is "bloomberg surveillance" with tom keene, jonathan ferro, and lisa abramowicz.

tom: good morning, everyone. it is a simulcast. we welcome all of you on radio and television nationwide and worldwide, and it is a packed hour for you. i've got to get right to the immediacy of futures up six, and that is the imf speak. git -- gita gopinath here in the 9:00 hour. did you see the lessening of eu growth by the eye meth? to me, -- by the imf? to me, that is the story. jonathan: it is the first of many, a reality check from the imf for europe. they basically cut the forecast down from 5.2% for this year to 4.9%. at the same time, they have lifted the outlook for the united states, you've got to believe the vaccine rollout is part of this. we will be speaking to the chief

economist of the imf little later this morning. tom: economic growth, 4.2%. we are going to stay on this. we've got earnings coming out, and also, our john micklethwait speaking with the pfizer ceo in a bit. the new potential gdp of the globe is a little less than it used to be. lisa: it is a little bit less, but increasing in the united states. that really was the standout with the imf raising their global growth outlook 25.5% -- to 5.1% from three point 1% in the united states. he question i have is is the pace of vaccination sufficient to meet what people are expecting in terms of u.s. growth, rich really will be the engine on the periphery of this extra growth the imf is talking about? tom: a question that just came into my puny little head, is the united kingdom advantaged by brexit to be separate from europe or not? jonathan: on the -- on this

occasion, they have negotiated their own contracts with the vaccines, i think it has been a big advantage. look at the rollout. the vaccine contracts were signed in the u.k., if my memory serves correctly, in may. i don't think they were signed at the european level until three months after that. that allows some of these vaccine providers to work through supply chain issues for the united kingdom. they haven't been able to do the same with europe. you have seen the results of it at the moment. tom: we welcome all of you on bloomberg radio and bloomberg television in a busy hour. eric friedman joins us now with u.s. bank wealth, their chief investment officer. we see the gyrations in the speculative market as well. what is the more consume it if -- what does the more conservative institutional money market look like now? eric: the bias one should have

in this environment is to keep paying attention to the data. i think you have done a great job as a team looking at the vaccine rollout, looking at some of the shortfalls we have seen. by our numbers, as well as by the early tone of earnings, we think the growth is still there, so we want to position ourselves to still favor u.s. growth and still have some positioning and emerging-market equities, as well as european equities. on europe, we are looking to take that and more of a rent as opposed to a long-term owner. that is probably the place we are most concerned about. jonathan: everyone is getting uncomfortable about that position. how do you want to leverage the global upturn was the story, and typically when you play it through europe, you want to play it through em, the cyclical parts of the market, but away from the united states. what would it take for you to pare down the exposure to europe? eric: with the improvement and

acceleration to the u.s. side or non-japan asia, those are the two variables we are looking at. if we see that picking up, we are already anticipated it some, but if we see that pickup more, europe would likely be the first funding source. the horizon we are ultimately going to get to post pandemic, post vaccines, europe is still very challenged. it is a slow-growing index, as well as the demographics, as well as some labor laws. that leaves us sanguine, so we have been playing more catch-up, but i think our bias is going to be to take that off in the not-too-distant future if we see some of the data points we just mentioned start to roll over. lisa: as you position both in the u.s., but also with emerging markets which china has been a bright spot so far this year and for the past few months, how much are you looking at the vaccination rollouts to different nations? eric: we are looking at it quite a bit. with a hat tip to jonathan's twitter stream, the data you see

just in terms of country by country, the differentials are material. if we were to see a supply chain issue, if we were to see some of those challenges in countries like germany, as well as other countries that have just been more slow than they probably should be, that is something that could derail that recovery story, so i would say it is something that we are not vaccination experts, but we are in touch with those who are, and it does suggest we are still in the zone of ok for now. but if we exit that zone, that could accelerate some of our concerns about those growth stories. tom: if i am at u.s. bank and i turn to you and say, what do i make of the new ipo process, what do i make of the speculations of reddit battling these shorts, how do you answer more conservative types? eric: i think the first thing is that we are certainly favorable about more access to capital for

companies, and the spac trend is one that certainly accelerated on both a cost basis, as well as a time basis. a number of industries and companies. so that is a positive. the capital that follows that, we want to make sure it is steady, longer-term capital. there are still really good sponsorships of a number of spac related companies, so on balance, that is a positive. in terms of the broader participation from american retail, that we also think is a positive. the formfactor in which that comes in will be critical. one of the things we are concerned about is how sticky is that capital once the market for a left jab. it always does, and we have to make sure we keep a balanced perspective. but i think the fact you are getting more people involved in the market is a good thing, and over time, those form factors graduating into other things

besides low delta call options will be a good thing. we think on balance, more participation is better than less. jonathan: let's do a therapy session with the cio. walk me through how it feels right now. do you feel like you're getting into parts of the market that you don't really want to get sucked into? eric: it is a great assessment. one thing we have talked about every single strategy meeting's edge. do we have a hedge over what sector may be bid up? the answer is, on balance, no, not on the micro basis, but we have to come up with a macro story. the macro story we still think is very favorable. we have to pay attention to some of these micro issues, but not let that throw us off the trail. our trail has been the global economy with accelerating growth. we will see if that changes with positioning, but until it does, we will stay positioning growth

assets, and that has benefited us of our. jonathan: always enjoy the chat -- benefited us so far. jonathan: always enjoy the chat. thanks for joining us. do you like that podcast, therapies with cios? a fifth property. next to joe rogan, i'll retire. you like that? tom: i see it. it's feasible. jonathan: the pfizer ceo sitting down with john micklethwait of bloomberg. take a listen. >> that you have reduction in your neutralizing titles if you are not effective in a real-life setting, but once we discover something that is not as effective, we move very quickly to produce a booster dose that will be a small variation to the current vaccine, but you can do

it in a very speedy manner so that we will be able to provide coverage. john: i know you are already at work on that booster shot -- and are you already at work on that booster shot in the same way that moderna is for the south ever can variety? albert: yes, way back we discussed that possibility that a variant escape the protection israel, and we were working on a process that would allow us to do the development very fast. now we have started implement in this process. we are working specifically on this variant right away. we are working on a process that, once we discover a variant that is sensitive, we can jump immediately into it. the work that is undergoing is very intense right now. john: let me ask in particular

to the speed of the doses. i asked dr. fauci, and one of the things he said very strongly was he thought there was a need to get that second dose of all the vaccines quickly because he thought that made a particular difference with the new variants. do you agree with that? quite a lot of governments are pushing up the second dose. albert: i agree with that absolutely, and i would say it is important to do the second dose on time in all scenarios. when i say on time, i don't think doing it a week later or two is a big issue, but in general, you need to make sure that we give the second doses as the study is recommending that the vaccine works. in this framework, we are fine. but beyond that, it is serious. john: is there some limit and that?

some governments -- some limit in that? some governments are talking about 5, 6 weeks. does the efficacy drop off after the? -- after that? albert: there is no data to show something like that, giving the second dose more apart than 42 days. but every government of course tries to monitor a very complicated situation, and it is the health authorities of every country that have the ultimate responsibility to recommend a vaccination schedule. but from our perspective, we know what data we have, and the recommendation is that you should give the vaccine as it was approved. john: let me ask you about the way we should sing about vaccines going forward -- should think about vaccines going forward. is the covid vaccine going to become like the annual flu shot? albert: i wouldn't exclude that. if you were asking me two months

earlier, i would say yes, it is a possibility. if you ask me today, i think it is a high possibility. but we don't know yet. it looks like covid, the ways behaves, it is here to stay. it also looks like we have the tools that we will make covid like the flu. that means it will not disturb our lives, social or the economy. it does need to make sure that we are very vigilant about the strains that exist, and we need to be very vigilant about vaccinating people. if it is a need to do it every year, for example, and if we have a renewed vaccine at the flu for karen strains, i think that is very easy to apply, and

transform it to just one of the many diseases. john: do you think it would just be one-shot, or still probably one-shot the does both covid and flu, or is it likely to be -- do you think it would just be one-shot that does both covid and flu, or is it lightly to be two? albert: it is likely to be both. john: the big argument at the moment on both sides of the atlantic are about supply and getting vaccines through. you said quite recently that you could get six doses from every file that you deliver, where previously people talk about getting five. can you take us through how that changes some of the mathematics possibly? albert: there are six doses -- the six doses out of a vial was never a surprise for us. we knew it because we are filling the bottles. it is just that when we were

doing the studies, we had five doses, and when we applied for the emergency use authorization or for regulatory approval in europe, we didn't have data to validate the six doses cap. in europe, they said you should apply now, and when you have data for the six, you should apply to us. so we provided it to all regulatory authorities. right now, the usda, the european agency, the who, they all have approved after they have seen the data six doses, so that obviously is very important for the pandemic because the doses were wasted that remained in the file and were thrown away. now it is not the case. people are instructed to try to

extract the six the dose, -- the sixth dose, and they have the means to do it. we have supplied already -- we have validated 36 div elements -- 36 developments. that has significant obligations. for example, in the u.s., we had promised to provide 100 million doses by the end of the first quarter, and we are able to provide 120 right now. in the second quarter, we were planning to provide them all the way to 200 million doses by the end of the second quarter area actually, the beginning of the third. right now we will be able to provide 200 million doses two months earlier. a similar suggestion is in europe. in europe, we will be able to provide way more in the second quarter as a result not only of this, but other measures. so it is a great thing for

everyone we are doing so, and i think it would be critical if we can use those instead of throwing one, when a vaccine can save lives right now. john: just one particular thing on that, on the issue of if you need an extra dose, does that mean you also need more kits with it? does that mean you need more syringes and that? jonathan: that is john micklethwait of bloomberg news alongside the pfizer ceo. much more on that throughout the day on bloomberg tv and bloomberg radio. this is "bloomberg surveillance ." alongside tom keene and lisa abramowicz, i'm jonathan ferro. already in 2021, just a series of reality checks about the year still to come. so much hope about the back half of this year, and all of a stud and you start to recognize we are not going to get the global secret has growth story, at least not as soon as we might have liked it with europe breaking down. we saw that reflected in the imf forecast as well.

i thing to travel stocks in europe have picked up on this as well. if you look at the likes of ryanair, i think we are down 40%, 50% since december. some aloof -- similar moves on easyjet and iaf right now. the bar to reopen these economies and remove restrictions is getting a little but higher, not lower. that is a problem for your outlook. tom: very well said. from a distance, as i look at the european presence, clearly the tone is it is just getting harder to get to that next step if and when we do. dovetail this together with the comments from pfizer and bring it over to tina fordham, avenue and hearst -- tina fordham, avon hearst founder. i love how you address in your note the walls of worry of january, and you make very clear they are not going to be the same as the walls of worry of

q3. the market is looking at the politics of the third and fourth quarter of this year. what will it look like? tina: i think your previous speakers have already taken us through some of the obstacles to the rollout. i have been talking about my vax populi theory for a while. the public willingness, plus the risk of mutant strains, but i think that a second phase is that period following pandemics tend to see more political disruption, and whether we are singing about the capitol riots and black lives matter, or anti-curfew protests in the netherlands yesterday, this is going to be a volatile period as we look to get this under control. lisa: let's talk a little bit about the politics of getting the vaccine out. there's a question of what went

so wrong in the european union that they are so delayed, behind places like the u.s. and israel. does this raise questions about the integrity of the eu as a social experiment if they are unable to plan on a routine, mass basis for their population to be inoculated? tina: i think that is a particularly american point of view. the u.s. just started its rollout, and is kind of starting from nothing. the u.k. where i am based is very pleased that it is outdoing europe so far. part of it is logistics. part of it is government capacity. part of it is federal versus regional infrastructure. i do think the eu will get there. i think there's not any reflection on the eq as a social experiment, as you suggested. the u.s. and the u.k. still have the highest death rates out of the countries that we mentioned.

the u.k. come out of all of the countries we are talking about, also has one big advantage, and that is a higher rate of willingness to take the vaccine, which is helping, and approval. it approved before the eu did. lisa: there is a question about the conservatism in the european union approach, not necessarily going as aggressively after the vaccines as early, and prioritizing the price, trying to be more democratic about the whole situation in terms of who gets the vaccine. it isn't necessarily working in the same way. what kind of political reckoning will there be in europe as a result of this? tina: i think my conception of this vax popul -- this vax populi risk idea of a slow rollout, plus or minus the vaccine factor and elections coming up, if week but that kind

of linens -- if we put that kind of lens over countries at risk, france comes out near the top with parliament reelections this year, presidential. italy always, because italy has kind of all of the risk factors, and the government there is certainly starting to wobble, so it is imperative that governments find the capacity to roll this out, and that they regain the advantage on competence because that is the biggest risk factor, a government incompetent. tom: tina fordham, thank you so much. this has been wonderful. we have mr. micklethwait talking to the ceo of a company, getting it done. we speak to tina fordham about the politics, and we pull it right back to the market response to the different countries and their timeline. i just got to believe the people that went in the vaccine game, their markets went. jonathan: they do -- their markets win.

jonathan: they do, but for how long? if the vaccine isn't distributed to countries outside of the developed world, discussing the united states and europe, that these variants take hold, and they are a threat to the whole global economy as well. i just want to have -- i just wonder how that conversation shifts because the focus at the moment is at home, and these elected officials, that is who they are accountable to. but at some point they will have to get together and look around the rest of the world, and a vaccine rollout that is nowhere to be seen. if you just go to google and search for the bloomberg vaccine tracker, you will find a nice, beautiful map. you go through each and every country around the world and see where they are, and you will see israel bright green, a nice shade of green in the united states and the u.k., and you won't see anything beyond those places, those geographies. europe, the united states, a little bit of china. but down towards africa, it is just not happening. tom: it is totally not

happening. the ft has a beautiful distribution of that, and the single geography where both sides of the fan have worsened over the last 10 days to two weeks is africa. that is the number one geography i am looking at right now. jonathan: and it could be an issue for the global economy. think that is what we need to get our heads around, the beaten strains we have seen, are they the threat to the outlook and the second half of this year? there just seems to be something additional to worry about as far as this pandemic is concerned. the hope that we would wake up in 2021, isaac we all knew that we weren't just going to click our fingers and it would go away. what i am seeing again and again with each and every passing day is just pushing back that placeholder on the calendar a week, a month, maybe even a quarter. lisa: deborah fuller of the university of washington really solidified this to me. the new strains that are more

contagious have increased the need for vaccination and for vaccinating a larger proportion of the population. initially it might have been 65% of the population that needed to be inoculated in order to get to herd immunity. in other words, the longer this goes on, the further away we get from getting to the end of the pandemic, and that is a race we are dealing with. jonathan: you've got this relative story in europe versus the united states. then within that, the question of the cyclical story in absolute terms, in isolation in the u.s., just how quickly can we pare back these restrictions? tom: massive shout out to credit suisse, who was pounding the table in late september, saying stay with tech, as well as do all of the other stuff. that group, ben laidler, all of the others that have said stay with tech, boy, have they won.

jonathan: they called me on my sabbatical. we had that chat. tom: i'm sure you did. jonathan: up to speed. tom: of course. why am i surprised? where's the dow? jonathan: we are up four on the s&p. you tell me where the dow

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jonathan: from new york city, this is "surveillance." live on bloomberg tv and radio. later today amazon, microsoft, big tech will be the focus. microsoft after the close. futures a little bit positive on the s&p 500. on the nasdaq, pre-much debt flat. we do not mention the dow. just tom keene on the dow. the clear outperformance in the last month has been big tech. that is where the consolidation is starting to happen. after all of the happy talk about that rotation, it is a reality check in the imf is playing into that reality check as well, cutting growth for europe, boosting growth for the united states. growth differential becoming a

bigger focus. the fed's mission, make it sleepy for chairman powell. that is the objective tomorrow. it is january. the market wants something to talk about. chariman powell needs to throw cold water. yields up one basis point. finish on foreign-exchange. when does the growth outlook, you are a versus united states start to bleed and more what is happening with euro-dollar? euro-dollar 1.2146. all of the talk about the stronger euro, the weaker u.s. dollar, that starts to fade and the outlook starts to back that up. for all of the talk of a weaker dollar, at least in the near term, the data is speaking loud and clear. the data on the economy will look much better in america for a variety of reasons in the near term relative to what we are about to see in europe. tom: certainly within the imf headlines.

jon ferro with that in the next half hour. it is one of the densest notes on wall street, a required read. we are thrilled ian could join us. you nail what is not changed as we going to january. and that is as inflation expectations move higher by any measure in united states. does that surprise you? ian: at this point in the cycle it does not surprise me. what did surprise me has been all of the bearish factors that got us to that 1.19 level of 10 year yield have been reversed with the exception of inflation expectations. inflation expectations will persist throughout the year. part of that is because we do not need to see real life inflation return to the system

to challenge this narrative that expectations will eventually lead to higher prices. tom: have you seen expectations and realized this far apart ever? is this unique moment? ian: it is certainly a unique moment but the divergence is not atypical when coming off a divergence like we have seen. we saw something similar after the last financial crisis. it took a decade to get the type of true demand-side inflation the fed would like to see. lisa: what is the bigger risk at this point? an unexpected rise in yields or not expected fall in yields as an increasing number of people move away from bullish bets? ian: it is very much a crowded trade. higher rates and a steeper curve. i would skew the risk towards the downside for raised being the pain trade or the surprise in this environment.

anyone is expecting the progress to put us in some version of the new normal by the end of the year, sometime in the second half. if that does not come to fruition and we find ourselves with renewed lockdowns because of the variant of the coronavirus or some other obstacle, you can easily see us drift lower in rates, even from here. lisa: when we say a move lower, meeting lower in the actual rate in the yield, price up and yields down. that to me is the most interesting idea. everyone is talking about inflation but the addition relation area trends are still here bank. -- but the disinflationary trends are still here. can you talk about how violent the move could be? ian: when you look at the futures data in the classic and ultra bond contracts, we see it

decided you in terms of -- i decided s -- a decided skew. when we see a correction it does not happened two or three basis points a day, it happens 10 to 15 basis points in relatively short order as we see mass capitulation of the steepening bias. i will be watching for that as the first quarter plays out. we will see the details of what the dark winter of covid has done to the real economy and people recalibrate expectations. jonathan: this is a structural story looking beyond the next six months for the next five years and what trade growth looks like and whether that structural story has changed. what we've seen after every crisis, we have more debt and for the treasury market the highs are lower and the lows are lower. when we come out of it we have these conversations about inflation picking up. let me go back to where we were.

trend growth lower. debt load higher. that holds back potential. tom: goes back to nominal gdp because you fold in the growth rate and you add on the inflation ian is talking about and you get to some form of animal spirit that is out there. in your world, animal spirit trip's over into went higher rates mattered. how far away are we to that almost kink in the behavior when it clips in that it is a new high rate regime? i would suggest we are far from that. ian: that is one of the biggest questions we are taking from clients. that is where do stocsk correct when we get to a certain level of 10 year yields? is it 2%? is it 1.50. we have not even reached 1.25. tom: where is your number. it is a simulcast.

radio and tv. where is your yield call where it begins to affect us? ian: we will see a correction in equities the closer we get to 1.50 in tens, but i do not think we get all the way there. i suspect any selloff stalls between one point 35 and 1.45. jonathan: ian, great to get your thoughts. i want to revisit a story. amc entertainment borrowing $900 billion. the ceo saying he will get through it. tom: how they do that? jonathan: loose conditions. the federal reserve keeping the market wide open. that was the objective. the policy objective was to divorce the economic conditions from the financial conditions. they have been successful. here's the number one question. when i sat down around this table and had this conversation with lisa. tom: never talked to me.

jonathan: one of the thirst things lisa said is what does the business look like, and i joked i'm not paying $100 per ticket to get back into the cinema. what does the capital structure look like and what is the tolerance for a global economy for higher interest rates. for all the talk we get to 2.50, we get there on treasuries what does credit look like and what happens to the businesses who borrowed all of this money to survive? how they grow into those capital structures? what does the business model look like. lisa: if you have this must get, -- this much debt, doesn't that slow growth? if you have a company like amc, who is going back to movie theaters? will movie theaters be the same? will we have the same business model or is there question of what that will look like going forward? jonathan: this is the danger of low interest rates, the danger of zombie companies. your tolerance for higher interest rates gets lower and

lower. what happens is you do not keep the best companies thriving, you keep everyone kicking along. it is the trap of low interest rates. we are in it right now. every time someone talks about higher interest rates, the one question we to ask is what is the tolerance of the school economy now for higher interest rates? is it lower or higher than it was before the crisis. you have to say, arguably, it is much lower. tom: i was just looking at amc, and the screen on the bloomberg is a train wreck. i wonder what the underlined is to get the deal done. i am with lisa. what i observed is my kids have broken the movie theater habit. it is gone. it used to be there. it is gone. jonathan: i imagine it will come back. whether it comes back this point is a moot point. the big thing is they have taken

on so much debt. how do you function? tom: 96% debt. jonathan: things will get better but can they tolerate higher interest rates? lisa: to build on that, there is an idea of lower rates being good for stocks, being good for risk assets. if we get into a situation against consensus where yields go lower because of disappointment in the economy, you have to wonder whether that challenges equities and equity stories not being driven by the federal reserve, if it is actually driven by weakness. jonathan: the low rate story reinforces the psychology of the moment. the biggest threat is we get caught in this trap where we think low rates means bigger returns and risk assets. allow me to introduce you to europe, allow me to introduce you to japan, where rates have been low for decades. it has not been enough in those geographies and will not necessarily be enough in the united states. lisa: this is the big question and something a lot of people

are looking at is everyone prices in reflation and we look at the debt being raised. you know it has been a record january for junk-bond sales in the united states? a record in ipo and equity add-ons. there is so much cash that has been raised for companies that have to face off with real questions about what they will look like post pandemic. tom: you have to understand, i've been in a hermetically sealed room considering i do not get along. you guys are killing me. jonathan: rubbing off on me. i was bullish in london. tom: i will give you that. you are bullish in london. now you are with abramowitz and it is like a -- jonathan: s&p global -- tom: there you go.

lisa: you speak in the dow goes up, i speak and negative watches. jonathan: coming up later, imf chief economist at 9:40 eastern live for our audience worldwide on bloomberg tv and radio, this is bloomberg surveillance. ritika: on capitol hill, senators will be sworn in today as jurors for donald trump's impeachment trial. their work will not last long. they will issue a summons to the former president and then pause for two weeks to work on president biden's cabinet confirmation. house members have presented the senate with one count of impeachment. janet yellen's first task as treasury includes selling president biden's new stimulus package and hiring a staff. the senate confirmed janet yellen's nomination by a vote of 84-15. she'll be the first woman to hold the job. during her confirmation hearings

janet yellen argued it is time to act big. that argument was rejected by republicans concerned about rising debt. senate republican leader mitch mcconnell is ready to move into his power-sharing agreement with the democrats. mcconnell has refused to agree to any deal to share power in the senate because democrats will not promise not to scrap the filibuster. that allows the minority to block legislation by requiring 60 votes to advance most bills. two democrat say they support the filibuster and mcconnell says that is good enough. the british government is considering whether to use hotels to quarantine travelers arriving in the u.k. the goal is to stop the spread of coronavirus variance overseas. boris johnson meets with senior officials today. shares of general electric are rising. ge -- it is a signal that ceo larry culp turnaround is gaining

momentum. it started before the pandemic when ge was trying to emerge from -- global news 24 hours a day, on air and on quicktake by bloomberg, powered by more than 2700 journalists and analysts in more than 120 countries. i am ritika gupta. this is bloomberg. ♪

>> covid, the way that behaves,

scared to say. it looks like we have the tools. we will make covid like the flu. we just need to make sure we are very vigilant about the strain that exists and vigilant -- michael: the expert -- tom: the expert in veterinary medicine from greece one of the most important voices on vaccine in the world speaking at our year ahead conference. right now, and for may be those of a certain vintage, the interview of the day. barry ritholtz has been a student of wall street. he knows it is cyclical. the way the game is played is things change and then there is a new sec commissioner. that is where we are. that is where we are right now.

barry, three times in the last week, once for me and twice for two other people, i have heard a citation of s.e.c. 33 and 34. what does gary gensler have to do to rein in some of the speculative excesses we are seeing now? barry: i am not sure that is his charge. the sec does not guarantee that you will make money or you will not lose money. their job is to guarantee a fair playing field and to take the cheaters away. you will see a greater emphasis on companies being more honest in their disclosures, a renewed emphasis on fighting insider trading, and some of the frothy are announcements we have seen over the last couple of years, the vaporware announcements about something big that will happen that never happens, there

might be ramifications for that in the future. tom: the major thrust i would have, whether i am right or wrong, is i believe a huge part of our listeners and viewers feel the system is rigged, given the speculative access. forget about gamestop. there will be another gamestop in two weeks. is it rigged? barry: there is an argument that says it has always been rigged. the advantage goes to the biggest and best financed, smartest institutions that naturally have an enormous advantage over the average person. that said, mom-and-pop have an advantage in they are not answerable to anyone else, they do not have to make orderly numbers. rigged is the wrong word. you have to know what your strengths and advantages are and

how to moderate your inherent disadvantages. i've never been a big fan of the word rigged. if your goldman sachs versus fred down the street, my bet is probably goldman sachs is going to do better than fred. the mom-and-pop investors who have taken their ball away and of left the playground and gone to blackrock and vanguard and said the playing field is not fair so i will index and leave alone for 20 years, that is their advantage. you have to be aware of where your strengths and weaknesses are. lisa: one thing i think would be fascinating is to give us perspective on the gamestop trend, the idea they are penny stocks that are going wild on chat rooms and real price terms and it is not just the retail traders, but also institutions

getting in and pushing up a certain narrative and going to squeeze out short-sellers. some people talking about how this challenges the concept of the short seller of the past. do you agree with that? barry: first of all, everything old is new again. subreddit and wall street bets, how is that any different than yahoo! message boards from the mid-1990's? gamestop is the new iomega. we used to see this every week there was a different flavor of messageboard driven craziness. you know how that ends, potentially in tears. some of the happier short-sellers keep their short preps -- there short books quiet and to themselves. it is a recent phenomenon that short-sellers would come out and go on tv and say here is why this company is a product and

here is why we are short. remember what happened not too long ago with carl icahn and bill ackman? that was a very public attempt to drive a stock down in a subsequent public attempt to affect a short squeeze. you have two schools of short-sellers, some who say the market is eventually -- short-term voting machine, long-term weighing machine. eventually the fundamentals will bring these companies down. we seen that over time. the idea you will talk a stock down or do something by revealing a short position, that creates a lot of risk for that short-sellers with that particular position. tom: we will continue this discussion. i have about six more questions. thanks for the comments on twitter as barry ritholtz and i talked about the path forward. barry ritholtz, cannot say

enough about his work. long conversations with smart people. lisa, your observation. what you look for microsoft? lisa: a beat. tom: it will not be a beat. it will be a smash. they will kill it. lisa: how will they kill it? will it be the cloud? will they gain against the amazon offering? how much will they gain on pcs? everyone has been working at home. going back to barry's point on the retail involvement, there are institutions that are driving the shift. there is a question of whether this is different because they're all of these people sitting at home board without the vegas casinos open who are looking for a new way to play, for a new way to gamble. you wonder how that changes the scene, especially given the stimulus checks. i'm just throwing that out.

tom: i do not disagree. you notice how jonathan ferro leaves us with an entourage to get over the makeup and the dow lifts? you see how that works. lisa: i was tracking it in detail. jonathan: up against -- tom: up against 31,000. on the imf, you mentioned china. a tick down but directionally there it was. lisa: overnight, this is something we do not deal with. the central bank of china came out and try to withdraw liquidity from the system, saying there will be an exacerbation of the bubble in assets. they are worried about asset bubbles unless there are certain reforms that are more substantive in terms of reducing inequality and building jobs. you are hearing that from the pboc there was a selloff in a number of chinese stocks. tom: president xi at davos agenda.

he was there yesterday. "balance of power." new jersey governor phil murphy. dow futures up 78. stay with us on bloomberg radio and on bloomberg television. ♪

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jonathan: from new york city for our audience worldwide, good morning, good morning. 30 minutes until the opening bell, futures positive. we begin with the big issue. investors increasingly concerned about one thing. >> the bubble. >> bubble. >> we really are looking at a bubble. >> there is a bit of froth. >> it is the function of the rotation. >> we have recovered and we are moving on to new highs. >> massive liquidity. >> reminds me of 1999-2000. >> i guess the bubble becomes a dome. jonathan: how long will it last is the big question? the diplomatic way of talking about this is pockets of froth. how many times have you heard that the last couple of months or the last 10 years? let's bring in kailey leinz. kailey: froth, bubble,