case levels as the delta variant spreads. a white house official tells bloomberg the u.s. position will be guided by public health. democrats who control congress say they are confident they can raise the federal debt limit in time to avoid a default this fall. but how and when they will act is unclear. the cbo last week said it expects extraordinary measures available to the treasury department like temporarily withholding federal bonds from federal retirement accounts, giving congress time to act before the government runs out of money. tunisia's president has fired his prime minister and suspended parliament, a move that threatens to do you really surviving democracy to have emerged from the arab spring. the president took action after

largely young people demonstrated in the capital and other cities, falling for the fall of the government and railing against hardships caused by the coronavirus pandemic. 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 ed ludlow. this is bloomberg. matt: it is 1:00 in new york, 6:00 in london, 1:00 a.m. in hong kong. welcome to bloomberg markets. here are the top stories we are following on the bloomberg and from around the world. we bring you the latest on the plunge in u.s. listed chinese stocks and an update on the stalemate in u.s.-china relations. president biden is facing headwinds on the virus and the economy. we will bring you all you need

to know on the rising covid cases in the u.s. and the pressure is putting on the administration. and we will speak to the coo of battery maker microvast about the state of the electric vehicle battery market. let's take a look at the markets this morning. s&p 500 rising 1/10 of 1%. it had been down for much of the day but we have seen equity indexes going back and forth between gains and losses. the u.s. 10-year yield rising to 1.2779. it had been down most of the day but it is now coming back up to the unchanged level. the bloomberg dollar index falling. 11.45. nymex crude down $.37, $77.61 a barrel.

really, in terms of losing luster, chinese stocks are front and center. those listed in the u.s. have erased $740 billion in value since reaching a record high in february. the losses, amid crackdowns of its technology and education sectors. joining us now is tom orlik. is this different from what we saw happen in the big mega tech, fintech areas of u.s. heisting -- u.s. listed education stocks, is this something new? tom: i think there is something new. yes, there is the same aggressive attitude by beijing regulators against big private companies, but there is also something else going on. there is deep concern in china about the low fertility rate,

concern at the high cost of raising children could be one of the reasons why chinese households are reluctant to have more children. the crackdown on the private education sector, which is seen to be adding to the burden of raising a child, is part of that. matt: i think that is the most interesting aspect of this. it is so expensive to hire these tutors, pay for these services, but parents feel like they have to to get their children ahead. from the standpoint of the child, constantly having to work every weekend, on vacation days, never able to chill out, makes you a little bit crazy. in a sense, it seems like a really humane move. plus, they want to up the child count. as long as children are so expensive, nobody is going to

have two, let alone three, so maybe we will see the reproduction rate climbed a little bit. tom: it is like an analogy of what we saw last year with ant financial. you remember, the ipo was pulled at the last minute, causing ripples across the market. it is like a repeat performance. you can see the public-policy reasoning. we don't want to create too many burdens for children. we don't want to impose too many costs on parents. that is some strong public policy thinking in this move against the education sector. at the same time, the way it's been done, the way it's been messaged, has created shockwaves in the market, and perhaps created some suit -- future problem for china because maybe private capital will just be nervous not just about big tech , education, but a bunch of

different areas where they are concerned a surprise regulatory move could hammer their profits. matt: what are people sing in terms of the next shoe to drop, if there is one, as you illustrated, we went through the text crackdown, now education. our chinese regulators going to focus on something else now? tom: clearly, we need to be on watch. this will be an unfixable process -- unpredictable process. one commonality we see across the text, education piece of it, is the concern of outside influence. didi was listed overseas, which would maybe give the u.s. a window into seeing what was going on in china. in the education move, part of it has been kicking private capital out of the chinese education sector. i don't know which sector will

come into the crosshairs of the beijing regulators next, but it seems that that concern about foreign capital is something which cuts across these areas. matt: tom orlik, bloomberg intelligence, talking to us about the china story. all the china stories are the most-read on the terminal. we are also watching, as the country lashes out, in a sense, at u.s. policymakers, a tense start to high-level talks. china saying their relationship with the u.s. is in a stalemate. we report from china. ♪ >> i am standing outside of the number one resort in eastern china. that is where top diplomats from the u.s. and china met to

discuss the relations between the countries. these relations in recent months have been deteriorating further. the two sides had a lot on their agenda. on the u.s. side, issues ranging from human rights and also military questions surrounding the south china sea, and of course, taiwan. the u.s. stressed to china that its collaboration with allies is not meant to be seen as an anti-china threat. on the other hand, china pushed back, saying it does not accept american interference in what it called its domestic affairs and will not be lectured to by the u.s. of course, the next question is what are the next steps? will this meeting lead to another meeting of president xi jinping and president joe biden? maybe another set of meetings ahead of the big summits between the u.s. and china, possibly

later in the year. for that to happen, we need more talks. given these talks took so much to arrange in the first place, it does not offer well for smooth communication between the two superpowers. matt: thanks to column murphy for that report. coming up, the spike in covid-19 cases in the u.s. this is bloomberg. ♪

matt: this is bloomberg markets. i'm matt miller. president biden is facing an uphill battle as the u.s. sees a resurgence in covid cases.

for more, we welcome our political news director jodi schneider. we are seeing this spike. everyone is watching it. at the same time, there is talk that maybe even the vaccinated will have to start wearing masks again. jodi: the numbers have gone way up. six weeks ago we were seeing cases come down, hospitalizations come down, vaccinations going up, but now vaccinations have plateaued. having a hard time getting others vaccinated, and the delta variant is here, the most transmissible variant we have seen yet. it's a problem. cases are going up and the vaccination rates are not going up. matt: it is a problem for the unvaccinated mainly. we will talk to the doctor in about this in a second, but for people who are vaccinated, it doesn't seem any worse than a hangover, getting covid.

but it looks like we are taking the carrot away -- you don't have to wear the mask. are we going to introduce a stick? jodi: that is the question. we are starting to see new york city's saying you have to be vaccinated if you are a city worker. we will probably see more workplaces that will say that because they are concerned, even though it is mostly a pandemic of the unvaccinated, there still can be breakthrough cases, and of course, the worry is with this delta variant, even some that are vaccinated could get sick. it really is, the hospitalizations and deaths is among the unvaccinated. it is terribly frustrating for the administration because things were better, and now they are not. matt: of course, we know the vaccinated can be sick. the question is how sick?

97% of the hospitalizations are among the unvaccinated. it looks like if you have the vaccination, it may not be so severe. i use to you out of asia all the time, now you are back in new york. i'm sure you've been watching the olympics, which has been controversial, but also difficult for the athletes who have trained forever, waited another year, and now some are testing positive and not able to try for the gold-medal. jodi: the optics are difficult. their families cannot go, nobody in the stands. we are watching their watch parties. all of that is to bed. -- too bad. but japan is having an uptick in cases. japan has a low vaccination rate, as does tokyo, so that is the problem. matt: what is the number? let's say that u.k. has 50,000 cases a day. where are they right now? jodi: about 4000 cases a day,

which is concerning, and that is up. also, the other concern is, with such an unvaccinated population, if they get this delta variant transmission, it could be a problem. matt: jodi snyder our political news reporter. for more, let's talk to dr. gigi gronvall. dr. gronvall, let's start with how bad this is for the vaccinated, especially, here in new york, everyone is seemingly vaccinated, certainly anyone that wants to be and does not suffer from other immune system problems can be vaccinated. is it really that bad? dr. gronvall: it helps to think about maybe how the vaccines work. for your vaccine to protect you,

you'll be exposed to the virus and then your immune system is not having any of that, and stop the virus from replicating. you will get exposed. depending on how good your immune response is, it will take you less time or more time, to counter this infection. maybe you don't want to have that experience. maybe some people's experience will be better than others. of course, you worry about those that cannot be vaccinated, and that is everyone under 12. matt: what does the science tell us about kids under 12? how do they react to the coronavirus? dr. gronvall: generally, they do much better than adults, certainly much better than seniors. if none of the adults were having any problems with covid, we would think of this as a terrible disease for children.

it would be a top 10 killer of kids. it is leading to a lot of hospitalizations. certainly, i'm hoping that we can get vaccines sooner versus later into the under 12 population. this is not something that you want to see healthy children having to suffer like this. matt: how are we doing on that, how much longer do you think it will be until we have a vaccine approved for kids under 12? dr. gronvall: the fda just asked, in the last hour, pfizer to expand their clinical trials of those under 12 so they can look for more rare adverse events. it is a statistics game. they have to get the numbers to see something that is rare. i'm not thinking that it will happen before possibly september, october, which is unfortunate because that is when kids are going to school. at the same time, a lot of places in the country are removing protections for kids, like mask mandate's. they need to do more to make

sure the kids have healthy air to breathe in schools and stuff, not try to pretend like the pandemic doesn't exist. matt: ventilation would be a great thing, for sure. how is this virus going to mutate in the next year, five years? when you look at the spanish flu which turned into the flu that we get now, which also is not pleasant but does not normally kill you, is that the kind of thing that we will see? that it gets more transmissible but less fatal? dr. gronvall: no one can say. this virus is the most watched virus ever. we are learning a lot about how the virus evolves, also in a partially protected world. i don't think anyone can predict. certainly, you will not get any mutations as long as people are not getting infected.

it will really be wait and see. let's hope that we are seeing the worst of what this virus can do. matt: thank you for joining us, dr. gigi gronvall, a senior scholar at johns hopkins. the johns hopkins bloomberg school of public health is supported by michael r. bloomberg, founder of bloomberg lp and bloomberg philanthropies. this is bloomberg. ♪

matt: this is bloomberg markets. i'm matt miller. now to something that caught my eye. the price of nickel rising for a third straight session, approaching a seven-year high on booming demand for the metal used in stainless steel and electric vehicle batteries. you can see metal outperforming

on the bloomberg commodity index. i also like to use the command to look at the entire commodities universe. you'll see any metals having to do with batteries have done very well as carmakers invest tens of billions of dollars into producing more electric vehicles. our next guest is shane smith, chief operating officer of microvast, which just made its debut on the nasdaq. thanks for joining us. let's talk about what you do at microvast. you make batteries. this is exciting because we are figuring out ways to put more power in smaller packages all the time, but you produce batteries mainly for commercial vehicles, like buses and taxis. shane: trains, mining trucks, specialty vehicles.

thank you for having me on. we are working on a wide, diverse range of applications where putting electric in place just makes sense. when you are getting eight miles a gallon and you can replace that with electric batteries that can last 15 years, it just makes a lot of sense to our customers. matt: especially when you can drive big vehicles. there is a ton of torque generated by these electric motors. is that one reason you focused on commercial vehicles rather than doing consumer vehicles, everyday cars and bikes? shane: actually the reason we focus on commercial and specialty vehicles, the batteries are far more challenging to make. you are talking about a well predefined area, the assets are usually expensive, it needs to

be on the road 24/7, sometimes has multiple drivers, and needs to last 15 years. we have batteries on the road lasting 10 years still operating with 85% retention. there are not many battery companies in the world that can show actual data with that kind of performance. that high-performance requirement in order to meet the high performance of these vehicles is what we do well. matt: how quickly does battery power, for example, double, or is the size cut in half? shane: lithium-ion battery technology is only in its infancy. we play a major role in what the batteries will do tomorrow. we all want more energy density, which translates into longer life. we are always pushing the envelope. we play a major role in that. but as we have seen, as others have tried, if you push it too

fast, you can compromise safety. we are conscientious about keeping our batteries safe as we push for longer life. so far, our customers have received that product portfolio we have designed very well by giving us more orders than we had capacity for. that is why this was a big debut for us. we were able to raise a significant amount of money in order to fund these facilities we are building. matt: the shares are down because businesses closely connected to china, like yours, are getting pummeled today. are you concerned about your future operating in china? shane: actually, not at all. apple is not worried about having foxconn in china, nor are we worried about having a facility in china. you need a facility on each of the major continents.

we have a footprint outside of berlin, germany now, and we will continue to expand in europe for our european customers. we are building a facility just north of nashville, tennessee. it will be one of the largest lithium-ion battery manufacturers in the united states, as an american company. the u.s. is now saying there is a role for electrification in the united states. plus, we have an asset in china. i think we will be balanced, able to meet the demand of our future customers. matt: also very cool cities. nashville and berlin, you cannot do much better. shane smith, thanks for joining us, chief operating officer or microvast. this is bloomberg. ♪

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ed: i'm ed ludlow with bloomberg first word news. two coronavirus vaccine makers

are taking a closer look at their studies for children between the ages of five and 11. the fda told pfizer, biontech and moderna that the scope of their pediatric studies were not wide enough, including heart inflammation problems. new york city is requiring every city government employee to be vaccinated against covid-19 or under a weekly test. mayor de blasio today said the delta verne is deadly and the city is taking it seriously. the mandate is the first expansion of a policy last week that requires workers in public clinics to be vaccinated or submit to weekly tests. china lashed out at u.s. policies in the first high-level talks between the countries in months. chinese diplomats handed their american counterparts a list of demands and to clear the relationship between the two at

a standstill. the chinese vice foreign minister says the u.s. is trying to contain the chinese. 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 ed ludlow. this is bloomberg. ♪ amanda: i'm amanda lang. welcome to bloomberg markets. matt: i'm matt miller. we welcome our bloomberg and bnn bloomberg audiences. here are the top stories we are following from around the world. all eyes on the federal reserve. we will discuss what investors can expect from the fomc rate decision and jay powell's news conference this week with tapering and inflation in focus. plus, we will discuss the state

of the real estate housing market and while the housing boom is slowing. and hasbro's big beat. shares climbed by the most since march 2020 after reporting second-quarter sales and earnings. the full breakdown is coming up in our stock of the hour. amanda: we continue to watch the broad stock market trading close to record levels, climbing that wall of worry. earnings in focus and some of those growth stocks earnings reports are expected to offer a little bit of underpinning of strength. all eyes on the fomc on wednesday. any color that we get in the q&a, that is where it will come, as jay powell is pressed on what tapering signaling may look like. tesla up 3.5% at last check. it will report after the bell.

the yield remains a big focus. on the real yield, record lows. the 10-year yield signaling a benign outlook for inflation. then there is what happened in hong kong as stocks slump. $740 billion wiped off values of chinese listed stocks amid this regulatory crackdown. it is hitting tech and education related sectors. me have said it was just a matter of time. if you thought the chinese government would let u.s. rules and regulations become the defective standard for chinese companies, you thought wrong. it's a reminder to some that capital in china will trade under chinese rule. matt: i also think there is something going on here. that, for sure, but i'm fascinated by the reproduction rate. china is not the only country trying to boost that because the demographics don't bode well for

the future, but this has been a problem for centuries. chinese parents will do anything they can to further their career prospects of their children, and now it's become very expensive. even though they have lifted the cap, you can have two children now -- they may even push you to have three now -- it is too expensive for the parents to consider, and this will maybe help them to reproduce more. on the other hand, the kids must be super stoked. like they got so many snow days in a row. they were having to work on weekends, vacations, holidays. amanda: the crackdown on tutoring and education. yes. that is not a bad segue to our next guest. everything is connected.

central banks and governments do not act in a vacuum. all of this affects real people. as the fomc meets, we are seeing market signals about what we think may happen. kevin nicholson is with us, riverfront investment group's co-cio. great to have you with us. matt makes the point, how are birthrates and education connected to the hang seng. inflation may appear benign to the fomc. it may not two americans hoping to gas up their cars. what do we hear from the fomc this week that is a reflection of that reality? kevin: this week i think we will hear more of the same. the fed will continue their script, saying inflation is transitory. you will still see that base effect coming into play over the next couple months. we will continue to potentially

have higher prints out there, but the fed will also start to gin up the markets for the real possibility of tapering later in the fall. i expect that to happen in the november, december timeframe. i think they will set the stage for jackson hole next month. matt: there's a lot of talk about the fact that we will not have a tantrum this time, because the market has been so well-prepared. this has been so well telegraphed. there is also the question of whether or not the fed is behind the curve here. are we getting real inflation, cannot get out of hand? kevin: when you think about it, matt, there are pockets of the economy where you are seeing inflation occur. prices are definitely going up. but you are also having demand destruction at the same time.

that has been re-reflected in the housing market and auto market, for instance. in april, new auto sales went down 4% month over month. in may, they dropped 10% month over month. today, you saw housing down 2.6% month over month. i think what you are seeing is, it may indeed be temporary, but temporary these days as a definition of longer than three months. temporary may be into the beginning of 2022 where you have prices increasing. eventually they will come down. let's face it, consumers don't have an unlimited amount of capital. for the last 15 months, that capital has been going toward goods. now that the economy is reopening, they will make a transition, they will put some

of that money toward services. amanda: we are all watching the fomc meeting closely, watching the path of the pandemic, especially among unvaccinated americans. we have these new mandates on vaccinations in new york. it looks as if california will mandate vaccinations for all state workers. as an economist, how do we factor that into the path of economic growth? at what point do you say this is a speedbump and we have to factor this in? kevin: amanda, i think we need to start factoring it in right now. earnings this season will be strong. most companies are seeing their outlook is pretty good. however, the one thing that has not been factored in is what

happens if we actually go back to having a more restrictive economy. we don't believe you can shut the economy down completely like we did the last time, but if we pass a lot of restrictions that will cause our service industry to not reopen fully, we could see a significant pullback in the market. matt: you are in good company saying the delta variant changes the calculus. just this morning, goldman sachs lowered their forecast for third quarter fourth-quarter gdp by one percentage point. my first thought was, cool, now we are going to get that percentage point next year, so it will not be such a strong growth this year and then a drop off. but how much of that growth is just gone? how much of that will not be coming back next year? kevin: i think a large part of

that will depend on whether or not we get the jobs coming back. if you think about how long it has taken us to recoup the jobs that were just lost last february and march, we still have not gotten all of those jobs back. we are still some 7.5 million jobs that have not been replaced. i think if we have another situation where this delta variant really shuts down the economy, it is going to really impact the global economy. we are going to lose a lot of that. it is not going to come back, to be honest. amanda: last time journalists had access to jay powell, the first thing they asked, likely to be the same this time, what is the forecast for when

tapering starts, what kind of notice will be be looking for? at what point is it incumbent on the fomc to signal a timeline, lay out a roadmap for what is the end of qe looking like? kevin: the fomc is an independent entity. technically, they don't need to let the markets know anything. the markets have become accustomed to them signaling before hand. i think this time around, if they have a two-month window, i think that's a decent amount of time to signal to the market that tapering will begin. that is why my timeline has been, throughout the summer, it would be jackson hole where they really started to throw the idea of tapering and put that in full force. then in the september meeting, announced that tapering was coming. that gave them two months.

so then by november, december, they could begin tapering. at this point, i think the fed has done a decent job at signaling tapering is coming, but i do feel the fed is a bit behind the curve here. there is too much capital sloshing around in the markets looking for a home. matt: kevin, thanks for sharing your insights. kevin nicholson, riverfront investment group co. cio. our next guest says new york real estate is back big time, bess freedman. we will talk about housing. this is bloomberg. ♪

matt: this is bloomberg markets. the federal ban on evictions in the u.s. is set to expire at the end of this month. this time it's unlikely to be extended, putting millions of renters at risk. the moratorium had been in place through much of the pandemic but it is part of a wave of emergency programs ending, even as the delta variant fuels rising cases. amanda, it looks like some of these programs will come to an end. the delta variant is concerning to a lot of people, but at least among the vaccinated, it is unlikely to put them in the hospital. the idea is that hopefully they can go out and get work and pay

rent, although i know a lot of jobs, industry has been destroyed. i can see walking by lexington avenue, so many of the stores are not just closed, they are not there anymore. amanda: one thing we know, even if we were emerging from a pandemic, there is a lot of pain that we have not yet realized yet. it appears they may well be another terrible leg down in america. you wonder if government programs have to be extended again, or whether that is too much to ask at this point. but there will be some vulnerable people caught in the middle of those who may be vaccinated but will still suffer because so many are not. matt: we all have sympathy for people who are in a difficult place because of this pandemic. we are going to talk about people on the other end of the spectrum now, focus on the higher end of housing that only those with means can afford. joining us to discuss is bess

freedman, ceo of brown harris stevens. we are talking about million-dollar apartments, homes, rents that are at least five figures, if not more. what does this market look like in new york? we heard about how it got hit during covid, everyone wanted to move out to the suburbs, but that seems to be turning around now. bess: that was true. during the pandemic, a lot of people left new york city to go to places where they felt safer. now, people have come back. we just closed the second quarter and the average resale price was up 21%. people are here and they are buying. also, i think the pandemic inspired sellers to be more reasonable. we kind of had a price correction, which helps to keep our market fluid. the other thing, matt, you mentioned the eviction moratorium.

i wanted to pick up on that. here in new york, it is extended until the end of august, giving tenants more breathing time. i just want to say we have some more leeway here in new york city. amanda: hopefully that is enough, bess. one thing that we saw were trends that were pandemic related, across the world and in america, a move to the suburbs, people buying bigger homes as they work from home. are you seeing a reversal of that, the shift back to more urban environment? bess: i don't think we are seeing a reversal of that. we are seeing that people want to buy in the suburbs. for example, in palm beach, for the first half of the year we did double the business in the first have that we did for 2020. people want to be in palm beach, connecticut, the hamptons. the problem is there is no supply. prices have picked up because the demand is so immense.

that is why there has been a slow down certain parts of the country. but new york is still a buyers market, rates are low. people are feeling a little bit safer now because they are getting vaccinated. i think 60% of the country is now vaccinated. but we all have to do our part and get vaccinated. if you want to keep the economy open, health and safety has to be of primary importance. matt: more than that are getting vaccinated in new york. i know there is no inventory in greenwich, bronx, summit. what about manhattan? what is the availability if i'm looking for a classic six in a prewar building on the upper west side? is there inventory out there? bess: do you need an agent? i can set you up with someone who can find you the perfect apartment. amanda, you, too. it is still a buyers market, according to the inventory.

and you can negotiate. sellers have gotten much more reasonable. there are tons of prewars, co-ops, downtown, whatever you want. the market is flush. people are taking advantage of that. we are seeing a lot of millennial first-time homebuyers. i would say it's an opportunity for people interested in investing in manhattan and brooklyn. amanda: only seconds here, but are you at all worried -- we know lending rates will stay low for a long time. are you worried about the types of loans, people getting in over their heads or does it feel pretty stable? bess: it is a different time than before the collapse. there are protections in place. i think -- we are a co-op market in the city -- so that keeps us pretty safe altogether, but i'm cautiously optimistic.

it bodes well for the future. amanda: bess freedman, great to have you with us. matt: i will call you. amanda: we are back after this. ♪

amanda: this is bloomberg markets. i'm amanda lang. alongside matt miller. it is time for stock of the hour, hasbro. it is hitting multi-year highs. a return to the movies kickstarting toy sales. dave wilson has a look at their strong quarter. dave: a move that toy makers have made in the past years is getting involved with television, movie, the tie-ins that go along with that. great when you have movies, not so much when you don't. in the latest corner, earnings

were more than twice the average analyst estimate. on top of that, and that income beat the average projection. revenue was 12.5% higher than it anticipated. hasbro has a number of categories. the franchise brands, magic the gathering, nerf, play-doh, up 72%, the fastest growth among their brands. that said, tv and film and entertainment were up 42%, the segment that fell off a cliff last year because people were not going to the movies in light of the pandemic. the franchise brands, the biggest piece of the business, but tv is catching up. when people see this out of hasbro, they look forward to what is coming from mattel tomorrow. you can see, hasbro playing a

bit of catch-up in terms of stock performance. matt: baby yoda versus barbie. they are making a lot of money. what will they do with it? dave: pay down debt is a big thing. this company took on billions to buy entertainment one, the maker of the peppa pig show. analysts looking for their long-term debt to be down $400 million at the end of the most recent quarter. matt: dave wilson, thank you very much. for amanda lang, i'm matt miller. this is bloomberg. ♪

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ed: i am ed ludlow with the first word news. the covid pandemic is picking up

steam across the globe amid the spread of the delta variant. the number of cases in the u.s. surged by 62% over the previous week. fatalities have stayed relatively low in the u.s., u.k., and spain due to high vaccine coverage while deaths are soaring in india, brazil, and indonesia. americans are urged to avoid travel to spain due to very high levels of covid-19. the centers for disease control and prevention has boosted the travel warning for spain to the highest level as cases climb. the philippine president made his final address to congress today. he pushed for opening the economy to more foreign investment. he also pledged pandemic support to help businesses bounce back and defended his criticized drug war. on the eve of his speech, protesters took to the streets and left-wing activists hung a huge banner that read