those under the age of 30, echoing an assessment from the european union saying it could be linked to possible rare blood clots. she reiterated its overall benefits. >> based on current evidence, the benefits of the covid-19 vaccine, astrazeneca against covid-19, and its associated risks, hospitalization and death, continues to outweigh the risks for the vast majority of people. karina: the u.k. regulator says, while it is further studying the possible connection between the shot and clots, the pfizer and moderna vaccine should be offered to those eligible under the age of 30. alexey navalny says he is "in fairly bad state." he is in the second week of a hunger strike. his lawyer says he has fever and severe cough. he was in prison for parole violations after returning from germany where he was treated for a near fatal poisoning blamed on

the kremlin. treasury secretary janet yellen sees the biden administration's corporate tax plan bringing back about chilean dollars in overseas profits to the u.s. over a decade. yellen says the plane would be fair to all americans and pay for biden's infrastructure plan, adding it would remove incentives for u.s. corporations to ship outside, abroad, instead using the critical money for needs at home. global news, 24 hours a day, on air and on "bloomberg quicktake," powered by over 2700 journalists and analysts in more than 120 countries. i am karina mitchell. this is bloomberg. >> it is 1:00 p.m. in new york, 7:00 p.m. in hong kong, -- sorry in berlin, 1:00 a.m. in hong

kong. these are the stories from around the world. in under one hour, the fomc minutes will drop. we will find out how the fed is digesting stronger-than-expected economic data and the markets may finally actually move today. if you are worried about inflation, you will want to watch the global chip shortage. we will talk to intel executive vp gregory bryant about what he is doing to meet massive demand, plus covid test start up loom era dx is going --going public. we talk to the ceo. let's take a quick look at how markets are or are not moving, depending on how you see this. the s&p 500 is hovering at an all-time high, 40.75, only up to points. not even. we think market participants are waiting to see the minute before they put on big bets today. the 10 year yield is not moving

much, yielding 1.6473. the bloomberg dollar index up about .1% at 11.44. i threw in the ftse -- 11 for four. i threw in the ftse. we close in london, 6885 is the level we are looking at. a big gain there, because we saw the pound go down against the dollar. the countdown is on to the fed minutes. investors will be looking for clues as to when the central bank might raise rates. here to talk about how the bond market is preparing is bloomberg fixed reporter katie gry fell. >> let's rewind to last month's meeting. you heard from the fed that he will be paying attention to the forecast, the idea that a fed will not preempt any rise in inflation by hiking prematurely. they will wait for the data to show that. you also show the median. show the fed will be on hold or projected to be on hold through

2023, but he saw two more officials pencil in hike earlier than that as opposed to the last summary of economic projections we got in december. markets will be looking for any color around that discussion as well as any commentary on tapering. the fed is going to stay full throttle on their asset purchases, but we know the bond market is pricing in more aggressive path of tightening than the fed itself. that will be an interesting discussion to watch. matt: what are we going to see in terms of inflation? i guess the word transitory or transient or some variation of those words is going to be used a number of different times. katie: absolutely. jerome powell made clear any earth of inflation that we could see out of lockdowns as the economy starts to reopen, he is not expecting it to stick around for that long. you had seen that reflected in the bond market, a kievan inflation expectations, higher

in shorter maturities. just in the past week or so, you have seen breakeven rates come off of the boil. it speaks to what a tricky spot the bond market is in, where traders are looking at the superstrong data we are getting, friday's job report is a great example. it months of the economic boom everyone has been talking about, and trying to balance it with the fed stance that they are watching inflation, not seeing anything material, and they are paying attention to labor markets. the bond market is trying to balance that right now, and the equity market is caught in the crossfire. matt: what are we hearing in terms of fed speak, and what do we expect to hear from powell at the imf meetings? katie: we have gotten a lot of fed speak this week alone. we heard from cleveland fed president loretta mester yesterday who said, whilst friday's job report was great, that's a direct quote, there is a lot more progress needed to get the economy back to the place it was before the

pandemic. you have really heard from all of the parade of fed officials, the same message that, yes, the data is improving, but there is a long way to go. the tone is coming from the top, and i expect rome how to say something similar when we hear from him this week. matt: thanks very much. loom berg's fixed-income reporter, katie greifeld, watching for the minutes out in just 54 minutes. maybe we can actually get the markets to budge a little bit. coming up, a chip crunch globally. we speak to the intel executive vice president, gregory bryant, about the unprecedented demand for semiconductors. this is bloomberg. ♪ ♪

matt: this is "bloomberg

markets," i am matt miller. time to check on the stock of the hour. samsung giving us first look at q1 profit. so far, the global chip shortage seems manageable for that company. operating profits taking a big leap forward as demand a sword. we are looking at the results and reaction. >> expecting a strong quarter here. 44% jump in samsung earnings year-over-year. 17% jump in expected sales. this is crediting towards its smartphone business. it released its new series earlier, giving its business the booze, and hopping ash helping to offset it a snag in the chip business. -- it's snag in the chip business. it was affected by weather conditions in the u.s. and i could chat -- have shaved off some all at a time when the industry is at a global chip

shortage, struggling to meet demand. chip prices are rapidly rising, so that is helping the business out. why this matters, it matters because samsung is basically the cause. it has 24% share of the market index, so dwarfing the other exchanges, so that has a big impact on the exchange, but also the way that we see, it could be a misleading indicator, of the rest -- the way the rest of the korean market is doing, particularly when you consider we are having rotation here into those value plays, away from the technology stocks, the big asian players, tencent, alibaba, and the like it, underperforming in the market. while you shares are lifting it higher now. matt: samsung released a new phone early this year, and it is hard for me to value people use

phones other than the iphone, but a lot to do globally. how is their strategy in that space? >> samsung is a behemoth, but it's smartphones account for the biggest chunk of its revenue. and these are 2020 figures, so considering it released the smartphone earlier, could it -- it's slice of the pie could get even larger. 8 million headsets were delivered between october and december, a record. matt: thanks very much. ritika gupta looking at our stock of the hour. several industries are feeling the impact of the global chip shortage. semiconductors become more essential to our everyday lives, and tech executives are feeling the pressure. >> covid caused everybody to step back a bit from capacity filled out as the supply chain of the industry and it induced a radical increase for demand.

now there is a meaningful shortage. >> the last year has been very difficult to deal with. never knew which direction demand would go in, and we saw sharp moves in industry. >> our ability to meet demand is based on supply availability, and everything is in short. there's not a single industry that has not been impacted by this shortage from automotive's, to home -- automotives to home. matt: joining us as intel's executive vice president, gregory bryant. let's talk first about the demand. is this a snapback from the covid, the pandemic lockdown, or is there demand at a level the industry has never seen? gregory: hey, matt. thanks for having me on. no, it is not a snapback. if you step back even before covid, we had this trend or the digitization of everything, whether it is the automobile,

factory, hospital, we saw strong demand increasing in that area as those services became more digital. with the onset of covid, we saw a massive acceleration, impacted demand, and the shape of the demand, and it was uneven across the industries. i believe it is long-lasting, truly an acceleration. in my business, we think about the way people are using pc clients and the way to work from home or anywhere, or the ability to learn and provide education from home. the need to connect with family and friends around the world, those changes are substantial, and i believe they are lasting. matt: we have seen the news of your $20 billion bet on u.s. manufacturing. great news really for people who need their chips, especially close to home in the u.s. supply chain. are you able to ramp up quickly

enough to match this demand, or are there areas where intel is feeling the pressure as well? gregory: we are leaning into this demand and investing in capacity. two weeks ago, we outlined our new strategy, the integrated and design and manufacturing strategy that is unique to intel , the footprint we have around the world. we are investing in our own internal capacity to meet the demand of customers, and leveraging the leading sure -- leadership technologies we have in packaging and building leadership products in every segment we participate in. in addition, we partner with a global supply chain and external boundaries and partners to help drive even more capacity in supply and advantages, cost advantages for customers. third, last but not least, we announced intel foundry services, our entry into being a foundry capacity supplier, a provider of capacity in the

united states in europe. we put our chips on the table. we are investing $20 billion in arizona for the first two factories, and we intend to accelerate our capacity to meet this demand. one other thing i say is we are unique in that we have this large global footprint, and we can work with the global supply chain partners, these third parties who are needed to build materials and individual components that help our customers deliver their solutions. so we are trying to help solve the greater industry problem that exists to meet this demand. matt: there have been analysts concerned, especially with government involvement, biden's plan to stem the chip shortage could lead to a structural oversupply over time. how do you feel about that? gregory: we think we are at the beginning of a decade-long cycle of demand. as i said in the opening with

the digitization of everything across industry, we think that demand is lasting. we clearly have seen semi conductors are an important and essential part of every industry. we have got to get on board with not just investing in digital -- physical infrastructure but also investing in the digital infrastructure. we think that is important. we are going to invest in capacity independent of that, and that was part of the announcement of the $20 million expansion, but we want to see support for accelerated investments. we have got to build up more quickly, because we think this is a lasting, decade-long cycle. matt: how important is the dawn of ai to your industry? gregory: incredibly important. or and more, these devices, as they become digital, they become more intelligent. we think we are unique in that we have the software, hardware,

manufacturing, and design capability, now foundry services to enable us and our customers and partners to build these more intelligent solutions to meet the needs of the future, and we are committed to doing that. matt: greg, thank you for joining us. we appreciate your time and insight on this issue. it is so huge, and you are in a key position to offer us a great view. intel executive vice president there. tune in for our special chip crunch for a deeper dive into the global semiconductor shortage and really the demand picture at 5:00 p.m. with emily chang. if you are watching this industry or other industries related like automotive, or if you are watching inflation, an eco-hawk, there is something for everybody on this program. here is something that caught my eye. in terms of tax increases, we hear a lot about it, it is going to hit millionaires and super millionaire earners in a very

historic way, if they work and live outs of new york. they will be -- there will be tax increases that are reportedly only temporary, though we know how those tend to stick a lot, for people that make or than $1.1 million per year. in new york state, cuomo signed this bill, boosting it to well over 9%. if you live in new york city, it is well boosted to over 13%. if you add in federal income taxes, millionaires, especially those earning more than $25 million per year, could pay more than 50% of their income to the government, and that is before paying sales tax and other tax issues. so very interesting i think milestone there in taxes to start on take-home pay globally. still ahead, we speak with the ceo of lou mere, about the

company's $5 billion spac deal, and it will take the covid-19 company public. this is bloomberg. ♪

matt: this is "bloomberg markets," and i am matt miller. we are looking at markets that are not doing a heck of a lot right now, one company is particularly fascinating, lou mere cx, going public through a reverse merger. you know about this now, a blank check company that values at $5 million. this makes it the largest spac deal in health care space this year, and joining us to talk about what the company does and its outlook is the ceo, ron swans occur. you are involved in covid testing, a huge growth industry.

we hope it is not a sticky one, right? what is the outlook? >> of course we created the platform you might have seen that is underlying the reason why we have done this spac. as a platform to transform the whole community care is dealt with. of course we conceived this many years ago, well before covid, where we pivoted to covid to be helpful in the pandemic. post-covid, we continue with a platform to address a whole host of diseases where you can address them more effectively in the community, such as diabetes, quiet galatian issues, infectious diseases, and so on. so the whole purpose of our platform is to have a simple platform in the primary care setting in pharmacy, in physician's offices where you can triage patients more effectively than today with having high-performance status which can be relied on,

and this will lead to growth well into the future. that is really why we are doing this spac, much beyond trying to be helpful in the short term with covid. matt: right. you have got a history at lumiradx. you have big customers like cvs in the u.s., the national healthcare service in the u.k., the bill and melinda gates foundation, and that has to be a supreme vote of confidence. what else do you see as a real growth area for lou mirrored dx -- lumi rudd dx -- lumiradx. ron: if we are helping people with diabetes to know where they are and improved over time, to help in diagnosing heart attacks

in such a way that you can triage patients effectively when the ambulance shows up before people are taken into the emergency room. we have tests coming for one called the dimer, which helps physicians triage patients and make sure they don't necessarily go into hospitals when the physician is expecting a serious issue such as a --, where today you would send them automatically if you were to do it test that triage is that, you would stop on the inconvenience on many people because people would be from the community into the emergency flow. there is a string of products like those we are bringing through, which we expect will drive our growth for many years to come. on covid, it will probably be around for a while, so there will be residual benefit --

residual issues around covid and also testing around the vaccinations, first if the people can find out if the vaccination is working and later to find out whether the vaccination is still working. matt: can i just asked, we talk about the fact it is one of the biggest deals, the biggest in the health care space in terms of spac. what will you do with the proceeds, what are you planning to use the money for? ron: the funds are to expand capacity around the world. we are in the process of building additional plants in a number of areas, because these product we are dealing with, and several others, we are seeing growth and we are seeing demands from customers about expected volumes over time, so most of the capital we are raising will be to build capacity. matt: greats getting time from you, thank you so much for joining us, ron zwanziger the

ceo of lumiradx, a company that has combined with a spac at a $5 billion valuation. coming up, looking ahead to a post pandemic world. what types of assets or private equity giant blackstone -- is private equity giant blackstone targeting? we will find out in an exclusive interview with chanel he bassett , bagging another great interview. martin brands is next. this is bloomberg. ♪

karina: iran characterizes the first day of talks on restoring the 2015 nuclear deal as constructive.

diplomats will meet again on friday. the islamic republic stuck to its demands. an iranian ship hit by mines in the red sea. israel says it is responsible. u.k. variant is now the most common strain in the u.s., overtaking the original. rising numbers across the country. new york announced it will be open beaches and time for the more real day weekend. public pools will open the following month. alabama governor kay ivey will lift the mast mandate on friday, following similar moves by texas and indiana. in a push for equal access, president biden will offer covid-19 vaccine shipments to all u.s. committee health centers, adding 2500 delivery sites to close the racial gap in inoculation. the white house will make 520 more centers eligible to receive shipments, increasing the total to nearly 1500.

about 70% of shots at the centers have been given the minorities. governor andrew cuomo says the newly announced tax hikes would be significantly offset by a repeal of the federal cap on state and local tax deductions, the salt cap. he has spoken to president biden and fully expect the current cap implement it by the trump administration to be repealed. he says it will lower net taxes by 30%. global news, 24 hours a day, on air and on bloomberg quicktake, powered by more than 2700 journalists and analysts in more than 120 countries. i am karina mitchell. this is bloomberg. ♪ amanda: welcome to bloomberg markets. matt: i am matt miller.

welcome are bloomberg and bnn bloomberg audiences. these are the top stories from around the world. in just a few minutes, part of our exclusive conversation with blackstone's cohead of acquisition, martin brand, about how the brand is diversifying investments for a post-pandemic world. plus, william rogers, former chief economist at the department of labor about president biden's $2.25 trillion economic plan. we will discuss all things fed as we count you down to the fomc minutes, due out in less than half an hour. they may move the markets on a day when we have not seen much movement at all. amanda: you could not have said it better. maybe something will move the markets. it might be the start of earnings season. take a closer look at the broad markets. pretty close to nothing as you

can get on the broad s&p 500 and the internals of the market are little more mixed. you are seeing actions with materials increasing and weight about 1.5%. communications and energy, tech, all higher. you are not seeing much moves at all. there is the 10-year quiet today. a big question is the descending views of the fomc on things like when rates should move and what they are watching. i will be closely watching for any notion of seeing inflation for real, not just estimates. all that on the minds of investors and the post-pandemic world. one of bloomberg's phone spoke to the largest investors, the cohead of acquisitions at blackstone. sonali spoke to martin brand about the company is looking for by way of diversifying assets.

martin: what's important is you have great companies. if you have great companies, you can hold it through markets to go up or down. spacs have raised money and have a great partners for us. such as the merger we did. if the market closes, we will hold the companies for longer and stay invested. we will find an opportunity. sonali: there has been fascination with blackstone moving from the traditional buyout firm to a growth investor. a lot of these investments came out of traditional buyouts, right? what does this speak to the private equity 2.0? what does this mean about the next wave of private equity investing? martin: compared to the

environment i grew up in, private equity firms have invested more in the capabilities. we have made a tremendous investment. we have folks like jennifer morgan who joined us for a time. we have a great it is science. -- data science. there is a lot of benefit for cross collaboration with blackstone, our real estate group, or joint investment between private equity funds and growth funds and other funds. we bring these people in and that allows us to grow the company's at a faster rate. in this environment the leverage as less for returns. matt: that was martin brand, blackstone's cohead of u.s. acquisitions talking to sonali,

it has been getting us an incredible string of interviews. she joins us to talk about that and another big wall street story. i want to shift focus to jamie dimon in a little bit. let's talk about blackstone first. are they concerned about the evaluation? this has been the conversation to have lately if you leave a -- leave out --sonali: blackstone has been betting on companies and doing well. bumble. sources told us that made more than four times their multiples of money on bumble. pay safe as well. they have done well. this -- martin was the brains behind definitive, the biggest exit for blackstone since the financial crisis, fall on the back of booming markets. can yothese returns of markets over to dimon, we see the

market booming to 2023. if that holds up, you see that boost the blackstone and other returns really continuing on here. you had stimulus on top of that and you see a lot of fuel for deals here. amanda: dimon said a lot of interesting things. one thing the market is focused on is about mispricing in the treasury market. he had still little bit, as he does. what do you make of that to the point about growth and inflation, the two major themes right now? sonali: while people might be hanging onto his treasury concerns, something he voice for a while, he said he expects a goldilocks moment. inflation to perhaps go up, inflation to go up from prolonged amount of time, but not excessively.

what do you make of that? inflation will not go up enough to damage the rally we are seeing in equity prices, but enough to make treasuries all that much more unattractive. matt: what else do we hear from jamie dimon in terms of markets? for us that's the most important issue. sonali: it really is. equity prices. to comes down to the optimism behind the market. everything else he had to say, he had warning signs about american competitiveness. the inequalities in the american economy and the spending and the focus spending. that's an important thing with what we are talking out with biden stimulus. the money does not just flow freely. it is catered into places that really needed. one of the policies he raised and people have not talked about today's minimum wages. raising the federal minimum wage. he made a case for that and a

66-page q.he talked about -- 66-page letter. he's making the case for policies that perhaps are unpopular to other corporations. amanda: really interesting. the voice of wall street in some ways. thank you for that. we do expect to hear from president biden with his jobs plan. we will talk to former senior economist at the u.s. department of later bill rogers on what a healthy jobs market might look like in america. stay with us.

matt: this is "bloomberg markets

." bloomberg news has written a fascinating story about the shrinking middle class. i learned a lot from it. we saw last year 100 50 million people globally fallout of the middle class, which is a little bit difficult to define but basically take it as someone globally he makes $10 to $20 a day in the developing world. hi did not realize the middle class had been growing without stop for the past three decades. this is the first year in 30 this has fallen. it is a part of a huge part of giant multinational corporations strategies. these people make more money and then buy more stuff. the interesting thing is my initial reaction was no problem. we will bounce back when we

vaccinated everybody. of course those vaccine rollouts are only going to last one year in the western world. everywhere else they will take longer, if they get done at all. it is not going to bounce back. there could be real lasting damage. amanda: it goes to something jamie dimon talked about. that minimum wage guaranteed income. you get to this. we're are only talking about income. it is really assets we should care about what people have, their total wealth. in most places like america and canada you can have a decent income and still be in debt up to your ears because he can't afford to live on the income. that is something that's a growing concern, certainly in the western world. it is high on the list of conversations. matt: a lot of people spend irresponsible about -- amounts of money on cars and

motorcycles and that's what puts them in debt. amanda: no names, matt. matt: don't tell my wife. let's go back to what's going on in the western world. that affect sub-saharan africa and asia. it will carryover. we are all connected. in america, president biden will have several chances to push through parts of his economic agenda without republican support. but the issue he is facing now is keeping his own party on board with his plans. we are joined by gill rogers, rutgers professor of public policy. he's a former u.s. labor department chief economist. thanks very much for your time. budget reconciliation is one way to push through legislation if you have got a 50/50 split and the vice president. it's a little more difficult if joe manchin doesn't want to play ball. bill: most definitely.

that will help to keep some of the items that people call christmas tree items to a minimum. i think in the end senator manchin will come along. it is good economics that is behind both the $1.9 trillion package and now this infrastructure package. it's all about the three r's, relief, recovery, and re-imagination. one point $9 trillion is focused on relief and recovery, providing the bridge to prosperity for all americans. the $2.25 trillion infrastructure package is around reimagining the economy and address the care economies, racial and ethnic inequality, and we address the general challenges of all workers,

white, black, male, female, asian or latino. even prior to the pandemic, yes, we had a great economy. economic insecurity was at an all-time high. amanda: some work you have done that really does highlight there were structural problems that existed pre-pandemic. the pandemic laden there. -- laid them bare. what are the quickest policy tools? the temptation is to go back to the old moneymakers that we are familiar with that could exacerbate the problems. bill: i'm pretty happy with what the administration has in their list. in my this test can into the question of productivity.

ken number two, is being done in a way that will provide opportunity for all people to contribute and all people have access to opportunities? matt: what do you think of using corporate taxes to pay for this? how likely -- how receptive is congress going to be to that, especially the senate? well that be another thing they have to push through with reconciliation? bill: we are still in the negotiation game. the big point will be how well the administration and the democrats are able to sell the story and tell the narrative that we have this recovery. when group of americans have done very well, on the higher will side. other americans in the middle income envelope have been

challenged. the argument that could be made and hopefully will be made is one of -- they may have been impacted by covid. lost a loved one. i respect that. however, on average, on balance the wealthier americans have done ok. one of the things -- i talked to my students about this. we are not agents. we live in a community. we have a responsibility to the brothers and sisters in the community. our behavior, whether it is wearing a mask, social distancing, or pain a little more in taxes to help preserve and grow the economy is the best thing to do. the right thing to do. amanda: really quickly.

our jobs the right way to measure a healthy economy given we will see more productive work that requires fewer laborers? bill: yes, in one respect. but also know. because of the pandemic and have it laid bare the inadequacies in housing policies and food policy, inadequacy about health policy. there is a whole metric of measures we have to focus on. my go to numbers are the millions of americans that make up the untapped pool of potential and others in the labor force that can be drawn in. i'm not worried about a lot of inflation. we need to let the $1.9 trillion do its work and implement the structure package for the long-term. amanda: so good to heavy with this, professor.

gill rogers, great to have you on board, professor at record university and former u.s. labor department chief economist. we love watch for those fomc minutes at 2:00. after this, a preview of what markets might be thinking. ♪

matt: this is "bloomberg markets ." let's get over now to our chief economist at bloomberg. the fomc minutes are coming in about eight minutes. carl riccadonna joins us to talk about what to expect. we will focus on how they digest the growth that's been even better than anticipated. carl: that's a good point, matt. but we are focusing on is this

restive, hawk is contingent that is growing on the committee. at the march meeting we saw the updated projections for the economy and interest rates. we could see about seven individuals starting to make the case for rate increases. at the same time, chair powell stuck to the script, saying it is not time to start talking about what the exit strategy with the click. -- would look like. looking at the tea leaves to give a sense of how they are talking about formulating the exit strategy. amanda: give us your notes for 2:00 only get the minutes. what are you watching for when it comes to those seven? the dates, what they are watching with inflation? what are you looking for the minutes? carl: it will not be date-based

guidance. the fed to summit to go down that route because dates can be so arbitrary. they will be looking at the economic conditions which would get them closer in the direction. something i'm watching for in today's minutes but a longer horizon is the fed's confidence in using the same playbook as we come out of this cycle or start this tightening cycle compared to what they did after the global financial crisis back in the prior decade. last time around they started hiking interest rates and began to shrink the balance sheet. they have been unclear if they will follow the same this time around. maybe they feel like they should try something different. i don't know if we will get the answers today but that is on participant's minds in the next couple of fomc meetings. matt: sequencing is one of those

great buzzwords, up there with optionality, transitory. carl: forget transitory. -- don't forget transitory. matt: are we going to see that play through in inflation? i get emails from people who have been going on about inflation for at least a decade. it is fair to say things like bacon, which have to be counted as essential goods are going up in price. carl: it's absolutely an essential item. i will not debate you on that front. as we look at the inflation landscape, they were inflationistas after the last time they expanded their balance sheets that say we will see in on mooring -- an unmooring of

inflation excitations. this has been a transformative downturn in terms of us learning how to work remotely and rely on technology and whatnot. i don't believe the economic fundamentals have been materially changed, or the tiger has not changed it stripes. we are still that a globalized economy where workers don't have a lot of marketing power. when wage pressures are tamed, consumer prices are tamed. amanda: so good to heavy with us, carl riccadonna. fomc minutes are a couple of seconds away. you for being with us. ♪

karina: france has been discussing a minimum tax on businesses with the u.s. we spoke with the french finance

minister in an exclusive interview. >> there is a unique window of opportunity to have a new international taxation system which would be more efficient and fairer. we are having in-depth discussions between the french administration and the american administration on this matter. i think we should reach an agreement by next summer. karina: france is open to a higher rate. the u.s. says it will consult with allies about how to handle the 2022 winter olympics in beijing. that sparked discussion of a boycott over china's human rights record. last year, more than 160 groups urged the olympic committee to hold the beijing games elsewhere. they guessing game is over about what suv -- what caused