lockdown restrictions later this month, but that scientists are still looking at data concerning the spread of the delta virus variant that was first identified in india, but has since spread. the comments come one day after the u.k. reported no new covid-19 deaths for the first time since the beginning of the pandemic. rivals of israel's benjamin netanyahu have until midnight to lockdown a new government that would unseat the nation's longest-serving prime minister. a former finance minister has been working to put together a coalition with two additional parties joining his group yesterday. if they fail to reach an agreement, israel could head into its fifth election in two years. u.s. senate majority leader chuck schumer is preparing for a summer of confrontation with republicans. president biden is hoping for a bipartisan infrastructure deal, but the administration set june 7 as the deadline. the president meets today with

the top senate republican negotiator on infrastructure. senator schumer will be pushing ahead with other measures that are almost certain to lead to republican filibusters, including legislation on voting rights and paycheck equity. areas in california, nevada, and washington are seeing sweltering conditions and temperatures in the region are triggering a wave of excessive heat warnings and advisories. las vegas saw its first 100 degree day of the year on monday and the forecast shows the city hitting 107 on thursday and 108 on friday. global news, 24 hours a day, on air and on bloomberg quicktake, powered by more than 2700 journalists and analysts in over 120 countries. i'm mark crumpton. this is bloomberg.

>> it is 1:00 p.m. in new york, 7:00 in berlin. i'm matt miller. welcome to bloomberg markets. here are the top stories from around the world. the jbs hack attack, the world's largest meat producer begins reopening idle beef operations after being hit by a cyberattack. chinese president jean jinping seeks a more love ruble -- lovable image. we will look into a diplomatic re-think in china. we hear from the author of the new book "the devil's playbook" about the rise and fall of juul and the parents that helped bring it down. let's take a look at what is going on in the markets. we do see gains on the s&p and other u.s. benchmark indexes. we saw gains here in europe as well. they are tempered, but we are

still seeing green arrows. u.s. 10 year yield coming down. the dollar coming down as well. really very little change on the dollar. that is a bit of a turnaround from what we saw earlier this morning. the dollar was gaining against most major trading partners. new york crude up again today. 1.6%. over a dollar. crude continues to rise. but the fascinating story really is the meme mania. take a look at amc. unbelievable. this is the intraday -- what? are you serious? $58.06. up 81%. this after yesterday, $230 million in new shares to help the company out, then dumped them on the same day, then

thought amc was overvalued. look at how much money they left on the table, a story we will dig deeper and deeper into throughout this program. let's get back to the big hack. the largest meat producer, jbs, is starting to partially reopen most idle beef operations across north america and in australia after a cyberattack halted them. bloomberg learning that a russian hacking group was behind the cyberattack. here is the latest. talk to us first about -- i'm fascinated by how many hackers are getting away with this and how much money they are making. did jbs pay out? >> we don't know what this point. so far, we are aware of this hack that was done by this hacking group notorious for not only encrypting data and demanding a ransom in exchange,

but also threatening to leak data if the ransom is not paid. for every day that meat is not being processed, the company is losing money. in addition, there is likely the risk that there is data on the internet if they don't pay the ransom. there was a lot of incentive to pay. there are people in the u.s. government who have advised against companies paying ransoms to criminals, it is a bad precedent to set and it fuels the criminal ecosystem. that is the question we are currently following. this comes after the colonial pipeline attack. they paid the ransom. we will find that out in the coming weeks. matt: it looks like basically businesses are paying. that leads me to wonder how do you get this kind of software? how easy is it to use? >> yes, so the ransomware criminal ecosystem is really interesting.

basically what happens is there are these groups, they produce ransomware, they provide customer support, they have negotiators, the kind of have the whole suite of services. then criminals they will work with think of them as affiliates and they will use the ransomware and then the two entities will share profits. that is how ransomware works. if an company has good backup, sometimes they don't pay. we are seeing people pay the ransom just because of how costly it can be not to. matt: but this is software as a service, right? there is a criminal enterprise that offers you the software. do they hold your hand and walk you through blackmailing a company? do they split the profits with you? how does the business model look? >> that is exactly right. these groups build a full suite of services. it is not just the ransomware.

sometimes they will do some custom code for you. they will explain you how to do it. they help you with the payment process, all of it. they pick affiliates they want to work with. they are picking criminals they think will get into companies and be able to secure a ransom. more recently, they have been kind of talking about limits for who they might attack. after the colonial pipeline cyberattack, the fbi got involved and it seemed like the criminals were saying, we should not be attacking targets that will get this kind of profile. but the really is a kind of hole franchise behind how these attacks take lace. it is a complicated underground ecosystem. matt: all right, very interesting stuff. thanks very much for joining us on this developing story. i'm sure it is not the last. bloomberg news cybersecurity reporter talking to us about jbs.

coming up, we will continue covering amc because unbelievable. i had to double check to see if our graphics were correct. it is up another 80% today. also, president xi's lovable imagery think. by china's president is looking to create a kinder, softer version of his country. we will discuss with the bloomberg's new economy editorial director next. this is bloomberg. ♪

matt: this is bloomberg markets. i'm matt miller. turning to our weekly segment on the new economy where we examine

how global leaders are trying to solve the world's biggest challenges. china's president is urging officials to create a trustworthy, lovable, and respectable image for the country. it is a sign beijing may be looking to smooth its hard-edged diplomatic approach on the global stage. for more, we welcome andy brown, bloomberg's new economy editorial director. what does this response to maybe donald trump leaving, joe biden moving in -- a response to a global shift toward multilateralism? it seems like this is the xi jinping we saw at davos five years ago? andy: i think it is partly an acknowledgment that the biden administration is doing a pretty good job building alliances now around the world that are targeted at china. i think this is significant. to the extent that you now have china publicly acknowledging what poll after poll around the

world is showing, if only by implication, that china is increasingly unloved in trusted and not respected. that is the first. the second of all, that this is coming from the top, the apex of power, from xi jinping himself. it is likely to result in some changes in the way that china deals with the world, if only rhetorically. i'm highly skeptical that this is going to lead to any real change or fix the fundamental problem. matt: i immediately wondered when i saw this story, does this mean the weaker -- wuighurs will get better treatment? will they avoid the optics of human rights abuses? will they give citizens in hong kong a longer leash in terms of free speech and democracy?

the answer to all of those questions i would assume has to be no, right? andrew: you have absolutely put your finger on it. there are three interlocking problems here. the first is what you might call a pr problem. chinese ambassadors all over the world basically being rude and abusive and insulting to their host governments, which has led to a real backlash. second of all, china's inability to really in a sense have a conversation, to engage constructively with china's critics. instead, it defaults almost reflexively to a bullying sort of behavior and economic coercion. those two problems can be mitigated. i think they will be to an extent. the third problem is the real problem, china is increasingly unloved because its policies are unloved. if it wanted to be loved, it would do something about the

crackdown on democracy in hong kong, it would stop bullying and intimidating taiwan. it might also be more open about the source of the coronavirus. matt: well, that is an interesting point. it will be interesting to see how that works out because obviously all arrows point toward the coronavirus lab down the street from where the coronavirus broke out. but everyone on both sides has been trying to work against that theory until very recently. in more of a wall street story, i find it really interesting that xi jinping is trying to reduce the amount of moral hazard they are susceptible to. until now, investors have thought, look at the state owned entities, they are offering great return, let's pile money in here, they will never default. china can't afford to default on something. they have been telegraphing a different message and now they

are moving shareholders -- ownership shares into different places to try and clean that up. they are really doing new capitalism well, aren't they? andrew: they are. the financial opening has been in spite of all the missteps china has made on covid, human rights. the financial story is a pretty good one. wall street is now competing toward china. this is all about restoring trust in the chinese financial system and that is actually probably being the most successful part of their global outreach. matt: you talk about the coven missteps. initially, china did everything right, even though they got criticism from around the world for these draconian measures of shutting down their economy and locking up wuhan.

then we all did the exact same thing. the problem has been the vaccination rollout. why have they lagged there and are they going to make a big effort to catch up before they host the olympics? andrew: yes, well, they did a brilliant job, right? after the initial cover-up, they did a superb job in containing the coronavirus and china. they were very slow, like other countries around asia, in rolling out the vaccination campaign. but that is actually starting to ramp up just in the last few days, we are starting to get reports that china is really upping their game in vaccination. now, the problem is other countries, you talk about the olympics, the real problem now is not the february winter olympics in beijing, the problem is the summer olympics in tokyo, which have already been delayed by a year.

a lot of people in japan want those to be scrapped altogether because japan is largely unvaccinated and they don't want tens of thousands of visitors coming in and creating what many fear will be a super-spreader event. matt: just a giant problem waiting to happen. andy browne, always a pleasure to talk to you. bloomberg's economy editorial director. check out the new economy daily from bloomberg economics focused on what is driving the global economy and what it means for policymakers, businesses, and investors. sign up for the new economy daily newsletter at bloomberg.com. i want to get to something that caught my eye just now. we were talking about jbs and that hack attack. we have learned this afternoon that martha's vineyard also came under attack. the steamship authority, which runs ferries to martha's vineyard and nantucket from cape cod, said a ransomware attack was affecting operations on wednesday.

this is a developing story, but it will be interesting to see as it seems that most of the big companies that have been affected lately have quietly paid out millions of dollars. what is martha's vineyard going to do? the ferry services when you need to keep running to keep that economy flowing. we will watch and continue to report on it to you. vaping has often been the target of politicians, but you may not know that rich activist parents were the ones that started the case against it. you still see it all over the place and it helps you immediately judge a person doing it, but you don't see many juuls anymore, except for on instagram. we will give you the full coverage. this is bloomberg. ♪ berg. ♪

matt: this is bloomberg markets. i'm matt miller. juul's valuation at one point hit $38 billion. it is now back down to $5 billion, but it is still big considering what happened. the tides turned against the company that was once thought of as silicon valley's most dazzling start up. a new book titled "the devil's playbook" takes a look at how juul has been weighed down by activists, parents, lawsuits, and politicians. the author joins us to talk about it. congratulations on the book. it is a fascinating topic. how did you decide to write about this? >> so, this was a company that was in the news quite a bit. there had been the youth epidemic of vaping. more than 5 million kids were shown to be using e-cigarettes

and at the same time or shortly thereafter, there was this outbreak of this mysterious lung injury. so, this was a company that had been in the news and i found it fascinating that it involved at this silicon valley unicorn that was getting so much attention, but it also involved the tobacco industry and big tobacco has a long, fascinating history in america. so kind of the collision of these two industries seems like a fascinating endeavor and it turned out to be a really amazing and fascinating story. matt: i never see juuls anymore. i do still see people vaping massive clouds of i guess it is not smoke, of steam or whatever it is. what separates juul from regular vaping? is it just a marketing or is there a different mechanism or method? lauren: it is absolutely a different product, really in its own category.

although there are competitors. what separated juul was they developed a this nicotine salt formulation which was a highly potent nicotine juice that they were able to stick into an e-cigarette device and heat up. it is really also the high concentration of nicotine. at the time it entered the market, it had a 5% nicotine concentration, which was higher than competitors. it is a combination of the unique formulation and the high nicotine strength. of course, there was the early marketing campaign that is now under fire from attorneys generals and lawyers across the country. but certainly the product itself was highly effective. matt: i'm going to assume you are not a vapor -- vapedr. you don't look like a smoker. i wonder what you found that surprised you when you started doing this kind of reporting. lauren: the biggest surprise to me was just how long the tobacco

industry, the marlboro man, the company we know related to philip morris, how long this company had been trying to innovate on the cigarette. essentially, today there are 34 million adult smokers. that is way down from the 1960's and 1970's, but for decades, this massive company had been trying to innovate on the cigarette to create a potentially safer product that would not kill its users like cigarettes do today. just how bad they were at innovating. to me it was surprising to learn just how much money, they spend billions of dollars trying to innovate on the cigarette and really could not do it. they just really were terrible at innovation, just like a lot of other large, legacy companies. if you think about the camera, kodak was not the one that innovated with digital film. you think about tesla, the innovation did not come from detroit. what i found fascinating is that

it took silicon valley to innovate on richmond to innovate on this old legacy company and once silicon valley got involved, it changed the entire dynamic of the industry and it forced philip morris to come to terms with that and ultimately they failed at innovating and in december 2018, they invested $12.8 billion in this silicon valley startup created by these two stanford students and it ended up, this deal is under scrutiny today. that was one of the most fascinating things to me, the long history of this innovation effort, and how badly the big tobacco company in the world, one of the biggest failed at doing that. matt: i'm always fascinated by the history of big tobacco and especially by their marketing campaigns which can no longer be as in-your-face, so they do these, they do these marketing campaigns that remind you of how

cool it is to use nicotine products. a massive, multibillion dollar sports, while i'm looking forward to reading the book for sure, thanks so much for joining us. author of "the devil's playbook," talking about the campaign against juul that ultimately really kind of brought it down. coming up, dave wilson is going to join us to help understand what is going on with amc. i was doing a radio show and hour ago and it was up 30%, now it is up 86%. all of this comes after they got dumped and shamed yesterday by one of their closest investors. stay with us for more on the meme mania. this is bloomberg. ♪

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mark:, harris will with world leaders next week. a spokeswoman says the vice president's goal is to advance the comprehensive strategy to tackle the cost of migration. the world's largest meat producer will have most of its plants open today following a cyberattack. its systems are coming back online according to a union official, it had a forced shutdown of all of its beef plants in the u.s.. bloomberg has learned a russian backed hacking group was responsible. ransomware attack has hit very service -- ferry service off

massachusetts. the attack has affected operations since this morning and customers could experience service delays. in hong kong, protests have gone silent due to ongoing rules concerning the pandemic. the vigil marking china's 1989 crackdown at tiananmen square has been bad for a second year. there have been weeks of almost no local covid-19 infections in hong kong, but the beijing government has expanded rules banning gatherings of more than four people. global news 24 hours a day on air and on bloomberg quicktake. powered by more than 2700 journalists and analysts in over 120 countries. i'm mark crumpton. this is bloomberg. ♪

matt: we welcome our bloomberg audiences each day at this hour. here are the top stories. lazard weighs in on the growing debate of working from home. what the ceo is saying to young bankers. then, it's another big day for meme stocks as stocks overall are flat. the fed beige book comes out in 30 minutes. we will get the latest on economic data. everything else going on pales in comparison to the insane run-up of amc. i don't want to use the word insane, because that puts a

value judgment on what is happening. maybe the stock is worth twice as much as it was yesterday. it doubled last week, as well. it was up 30% yesterday. maybe moderate capital is the dope because they left so much money on the table. it is an unbelievable story. >> maybe it is worth that. we are watching what we call the meme stocks today. blackberry is another one up 18%. the most talked about stock. broad markets paint a picture of not double digit advances, we have very quiet markets here, basically rake even.

energy is showing leadership in the s&p 500. weakness for materials and industrial. we will talk more about this later in the show. it has been sideways for the s&p for a while now. we see a couple of stocks getting the social media attention and rocketing higher. matt: i can't think about anything i would rather talk about than amc. it reminds me of the days we saw gamestop rally big, but gamestop is no longer the darling of wall street. blackberry gets some mentions, for sure. it really is about amc. it's our stock of the hour and it shows little signs of stopping this incredible run. dave, i am still perplexed as to why this company which has

helped amc out for a long time now would then turn around and tell customers that it is undervalued. it doesn't make a lot of sense. dave: you mean overvalued. that hasn't stopped amc from taking off today. it is been building for the past week and a half with shares having more than doubled last week. you can make the case that now that we're getting past the memorial day weekend, that people are starting to go back to movies, the big-budget films are coming back. that is what has brought about the excitement at amc. in terms of stock performance, it has supplanted gamestop as the company among those amateur traders. that is the thing.

you are talking about a company that if it weren't in the s&p 500, it would be in the top half as far as bargain value. it shows you how much has changed in the space of a week and a half. you can see what that translates to an terms of year-to-date performance. amc leaving gamestop and other companies in the dust. >> retail traders that are buying and selling, who else is benefiting from the run-up at amc? >> moderate has benefited. in the sense that they were able to take advantage of their stock purchase and turn around and resell the shares. they were able to raise money and they have done it before. the idea of tripling the numbers

outstanding. that has been important for a company that has $5 billion in debt and you look at their equity, it is negative. >> this is the stock that we are watching today. for what it's worth, we are also hearing a lot of talk about the future of work. how much we have done remotely. we have seen some employers especially banks asking their employees to get back to the office. earlier, we spoke exclusively with the ceo of lazard about his thought on remote work. this has been an extraordinarily productive year. >> we haven't missed much in terms of being out of the office. it has impacts on being able to

recruit and train the best of our people. ultimately, this is an in office experience. i expect this fall, we will be more in the office. >> cultures are developed in person. when you ask employees what they want, those who never want to go back and those who definitely want to go back are the biggest groups completely opposed. i don't know what employers are supposed to do. matt: it's interesting how it breaks down on either side of the atlantic. wall street seems to want workers back in the office come rain or shine. you have that gen z millennial versus boomer thing going on. here in europe, there is more of a hybrid approach. we talk about political platforms, we talk about manifestoes.

there is a different culture in europe than in the u.s.. it's interesting to see the breakdown. we're going to talk about more battles between optimism or between optimism on the economic reopening and inflation in the markets. we're going to talk a lot about charts and technical. we're going to get into the meme stocks a little bit. our guest joins us to discuss what investors are watching and the opportunities ahead. of course, we have to ask him about amc. this is bloomberg. ♪

matt: this is bloomberg markets. outside of amc, u.s. stocks are flat today. we continue the sideways trading we have seen in the s&p 500 over the last couple of sessions. here in europe, we continue to hit new highs. in the u.s., it appears traders and investors are waiting on some signals out of the fed and the data as to whether or not we are seeing explosive reopening growth or are we getting big inflation along with it. >> it feels like such an interesting time, because we are grinding sideways. the chart tells the story. you say there has to be a catalyst. there could equally be a

catalyst to the downside as to the upside. the big question is, which is it going to be? matt: it could go either way. joining us with his perspective is the chief market strategist at bell curve trading. it does look like this market is waiting for a catalyst. it looks like traders are sitting on their hands watching -- where is the most important place to look and what you looking for? >> in some sense, the narrative is similar to the last several months. i think you can buy the dips. i think the market will make gains to the upside. we're in a different stage of the rally now. my first interview this year on bloomberg was january 13 and the

dow was at 31,000. today, the dow is on its way to 35,000. we are at us different stage of the game right now. when you look at the market off of the march lows, the nasdaq is up over 100%. how much further can this go? when you look at the main trends driving the market, we have already hit the target. off the march 2020 lows, we're looking at 4500. yes the market can go higher, but if this is a baseball game, we are in the seventh inning. then i think you have to start to play some defense. for people who are watching this show and are in accumulation

mode, you have to put the brakes a little bit and try to use the next points in the s&p reduce your equity exposure. matt: you have to put it into hockey terms for amanda to understand. >> or lacrosse. i'm canadian. i do want to ask you, you have a new target for that 7% higher on the s&p 500. i think investors will like that idea that we are in the seventh or eighth inning and it may be time to lighten up. you made a good call back in february to load up on financials and energy. they benefit from economic expansion. are they also late inning or do you stay with those traits? >> that's a good question. i think the energy still has a way to go on the upside. the industrials could trade at

125 so there is still some juice there. another thing i liked in february was financials. that has been a great trade for us. the xls is getting close to important target. that's when you run into significant resistance. i want to again take our remaining profits but i think the xl i, xle, why hf to the upside. matt: what do you think about, i don't want to say insanity because i haven't done the financials on amc myself or gamestop although i can't imagine buying a videogame from anyone other than the maker of might consult or the platform i am playing on. i won't go to a store to do it.

i haven't run the financials on blackberry or nokia, but these stocks have gotten wings as retail traders clobber institutions. how is this happening? >> that's a good question. i look at this stuff as distractions to the broader market. if you are in stocks like amc, gamestop, that money should be totally discretionary. you should be willing to lose everything in those names. it's a lottery ticket. this is the sort of thing that happens in the late stages of a major rally. things get crazy. i'm not surprised that you have the sorts of anomalies. for people watching the show, to meet this isn't investing. it's videogame/gambling. i would be careful to get involved in any of these names. >> you made a contrary and call

in the spring on gold. we are waiting for the beige book. it might be the catalyst the markets are looking for. d fit in? >> when i was on your show in march, you estimate an interesting question, you said what is your most contrarian call? at the time, gold was getting pounded. i said in march, i still haven't given up on it. i still think old is going to make a comeback. at that time, we closed around $1720. now, it's back around 1900. all of what to see gold do is go sideways. if it can hold these gains over the next month or two, it's going to set a base up for another major move higher. it wouldn't surprise me late this year into next year to see gold up to $2500.

it's key to hold these gains. it has been impressive the fact that the market has not given up anything. if we can hold these gains, it sets us up for another major move to the upside. >> you have been right about a lot of things. always good to talk to you. i want to mention president biden is speaking right now. he is making comments about the vaccination efforts and the general response to covid-19. you can watch that on your terminal. we are back after this. ♪

♪ >> this is bloomberg markets.

in a few minutes, we will see the fed beige book. there may be a little more color on what the fed is thinking about in terms of inflationary pressures. we will be watching the labor market. the fed has made it clear that's what they're watching. kathy is with us now. she is a chief economist. i want to stay with the labor market because there is a weird anomaly where fiscal monetary support may be keeping people from rejoining the labor force. the fed's says we won't move until the labor force gets back to normal. as an economist, how do you parse through what is real and what isn't? >> there is a raging debate about that. was the fiscal stimulus too

generous and is that keeping people on the sidelines? or is probably some of that, but we think there is much more to the story. first of all, we see people want to return back to work. we had a little bit of a pause in the month of april, but we do think it will pick up in may. also, there are ongoing childcare issues. we will get a big boost come september and it is the younger children, if they are able to get vaccinated, we can send those kids off to camp with less concern. it's the younger children that are the issue. the benefits will roll up and half of the states have used the extra top off and unemployment benefits. we think we will start to see

the per dissipation rate and the people coming back to the workforce. matt: i'm glad if we were a little bit generous. let me ask you if we are going to stay that way. have you seen a change in not only the way the u.s. but western governments are trying to recover from the pandemic? previously for the last 40 years, everything was dealt with by a monetary policy since volker and now fiscal stimulus or support is really the name of the game. is this the new era? >> that's a great point. we also saw that after the great financial crisis. we did need the bailout of the banks and the tarp in the fiscal stimulus to get the economy going. monetary policy can be powerful, but it can't do it alone. in this situation, you could say

it's a liquidity trap so you needed that fiscal policy boost which we got in a significant way. the question now is how much more do we get and that is being actively debated between the republicans and the democrats. >> it's always good to have you with us. we are just a few minutes away from the beige book. we will bring it to you and all of the pertinent details from matt miller. this is "bloomberg markets." ♪

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♪ mark: ports johnson says his

government remains on course to lift lockdown restrictions later this month. the scientists are still looking at data concerning the spread of the delta virus variant was first did to fight in india. -- it was first identified in india. >> we need to give it a little bit longer. >> the prime minister's comments come one day after the u.k. recorded no new covid-19 deaths for the first time since the pandemic began. a new u.s. senate ruling could complicate the ability of democrats to use a fast-track process to enact president biden's economic agenda without bipartisan support. officials say the process used -- known as reconciliation can be used more than once a year but there are limitations. to use limited -- reconciliation numerous times, lawmak