>> from the heart of where innovation, money, and power call i'd come in silicon valley and beyond, this is "bloomberg technology" with emily chang. emily: this is "bloomberg technology." russia calling facebook and instagram extremists and asking a court to ban them. how meta-is responding. plus, upwork and other companies

halting their operations in russia but facing backlash for the russian workers getting caught in the crossfire. and elizabeth holmes has good reason to preach against her ex-boyfriend as he prepares to take his turn at trial. what to expect from his case later this hour. first, no progress in talks between ukraine and russia according to ukraine's top diplomat. stocks having their worst weekend months. walk us through this friday. kriti: the selling does not stop. three of the eight weeks have been positive. this week, another down week. we are starting to see diplomatic efforts between ukraine and russia not pan out and that is why you are seeing a risk off tone. you are seeing higher commodities prices. 112 on brent. as long as those prices are above 100, the stock market is

not going to respond well. oil has a wisconn valley, yet you see those prices extremely high. you're seeing some money come out of here as we talk about a hawkish fed, the focus from ukraine, russia, and what that means for the federal reserve. let's talk about another sector, semiconductors. we know there is that global chip shortage that continues to echo across the world. you did to see this one up in the semiconductor stock last year. since the year has started, it has pared those gains and a chunk of that has to do with what the biden administration is aiming for qamar cutting off russia from that supply chain and a lot of this includes access to semiconductors. you're seeing one of the sources of demand drop. let's talk about the micro story.

some pretty big moves aside from the russia-ukraine story. oracle actually up 1.5%. they missed earnings, they did not have a great forecast. they are working on their cloud platform and the idea that they are going to be competing with microsoft, amazon, that putting a little bit of wind in this stock. dd dropping after they say they are holding their hong kong listing. didi now getting its biggest loss on the day since last june. emily: huge loss. we will be following when that opens at the end of the weekend. ukraine's top diplomat pushing back on the suggestion of positive movement with talks with russia, as they were described by vladimir putin. the ukrainian foreign minister

speaking exclusively with annmarie hordern. >> there was zero talks so it is hard for me to understand what putin is referring to. they are killing our children, civilians. it speaks to one side only, that even if we continue talking with russia, that does not have an effect on the behavior of the russian army on the ground. emily: he also said ongoing talks are not impacting russia's heavy on the ground adding that a meeting between russia's and ukraine's president would be helpful. president biden earlier saying the u.s. would defend every inch of nato territory, even if it meant world war iii, but not a single inch of ukraine. where does this leave ukraine? >> he was speaking at a

gathering. this calls into question whether the u.s. could do more. he said, we are going to defend nato countries, ukraine not one of those, even if that means world war iii. he said, we are not going to defend every inch of ukraine, because giving them offensive weapons, tanks, planes, and joe biden's view, would trigger world war iii. a bit of pushback from him on these calls we have seen for planes to be given directly or the setting up of that no-fly zone. where that leaves him -- he was speaking after announcing new measures, the g7 and other countries working to revoke the most favorite nation trading status of russia. the big move, a broad move that would allow them to hike iteris across the board -- hike tariffs across the board and he went farther saying they are not

going to import some stuff at all like seafood, diamonds, other goods. a symbolic strike. continuing to ratchet up sanctions. an hour ago, we got new specific things, individuals, including the family of president putin's spokesperson from the treasury department. we are trying to increase the pressure but using economic sanctions, not ratcheting up the military side. emily: what kind of additional pain is this going to inflict on russia and is this going to be what ukraine needs, when the attacks show no sign of slowing down? josh: it is a great question. i don't think you are going to find a lot of people predicting that the end of his near -- the end is near. markets react to prudence comments -- react to president

putin's comments. joe biden has been bragging about the impact so far, he says the ruble is 200 rubles for one u.s. dollar. he says when the russian stock market opens, it would collapse. they think they are making progress. i think they would say that they don't have a ton of options and perhaps you can hear over the microphone, there is a protest going on here signifying the pressure joe biden is on, calling on him to do more. emily: the polls are showing that most americans support the ban on russian oil but in california, i am seeing even seven dollars at the pump. president biden is trying to get u.s. oil producers to make more but they are wary, given the history. is he going to be able to do that? josh: a lot of those producers have been scraping by or worse.

they are finally in a profitable environment and they make decisions several months out and they say they don't know what the probability is going to look like seven or 12 months down the road. our colleagues have a piece on the terminal today about joe biden's icy history with the oil industry. now he is crawling over to them for help to lower prices, he is not getting a lot of it. we are not looking like we are going to see a lot of it soon. part of that is because u.s. production remains high, it is just that global production is struggling to meet the mark with russian oil being removed in part or in full. emily: thank you for those updates. according to interfax, russian prosecutors have asked a court to ban facebook and instagram as extremist.

this is a move in a crackdown on social networks as a digital iron curtain falls. kurt wagner joining us now with more. meta was in hot water yesterday for relaxing a policy on violence on the platform just for ukraine. talk to us about that and how that unfolded. >> facebook or meta has rules about threatening violence, wishing violence on another person. what they said they are going to relax those rules for ukraine so ukrainians can post freely about defending their country. if they say something about, kill these russian soldiers who are coming into our city, that would be the kind of thing that would be against facebook's existing policies, so they want to be able to leave that of -- leave that up, a self-defense

type of thing. you can imagine, this got murky quickly and a lot of people are wondering, where do you draw the line? someone from facebook site, it is just an ukraine, it is temporary, and does not apply to threats against russian citizens, it is only against the russian army. that is one of the things that sparked russian regulators to say, we want facebook and instagram blocked in the country. emily: russia calling on authorities in russia to stop the "extremist" activities of meta, take measures to bring the perpetrators, as they call it, to justice, hitting two nations against each other -- pitting two nations against each other. nick saying, if we applied our stated policies without any adjustment, we would be removing content from youth -- from ordinary ukrainians, which would

be viewed as unacceptable. what do you make of meta's changing the rules temporarily, they say? it is unprecedented, isn't it? kurt: this whole situation is unprecedented and the fact that they are willing to review these in real-time, review these for a temporary amount of time is probably a good thing. it is showing the -- showing that the company is responsive to the happenings on the ground. is it a perfect situation? absolutely not. but it would be worse if they were not willing to acknowledge that this is not a regular week. this is a war and they are trying to adapt on-the-fly. i view this as progress. setting aside whether you think they should be changing the policy, the fact that they are trying to be adaptive is a good thing for future issues.

emily: where does facebook stand in russia now? is it available? kurt: facebook has been blocked in russia for about a week now. what we heard from regulators today is they are planning to block instagram starting monday. that would be two of the three services, whatsapp is also available in russia, as far as i know will continue to be. we have seen facebook take a stricter stance, they say they are not going to accept ad money from russian advertisers or businesses. this is becoming a genetic split between russia and meta and makes me wonder if this is something they are going to be able to come back together at some point after this war, or is this a thing where this is the end of russia and facebook and instagram operating in russia. i do not think it is out of the question. emily: facebook has been banned

in china since 2008. interesting implications for what happens after the war, hopefully there is an after, and how facebook will reevaluate its rules. thank you for the update. as more companies leave russia, we are going to talk to hayden brown about his decision to cut off gig workers in russia and belarus. and how they are helping freelancers trapped in ukraine. this is bloomberg. ♪

emily: with the war and ukraine, many companies have been taking a stand by shutting down operations in russia to distance themselves from the invader and send a message to vladimir putin. one such company is upwork which decided to suspend business operations in russia and belarus. i want to bring in hayden brown. this was a controversial move because it means cutting off gig workers in these countries you may have nothing to do with this war, may not support this war why did you decide to do this? hayden: our hearts go out to everyone in ukraine and russia and belarus you have been impacted. this was a tough decision for us because it cuts to the heart of our business and our heritage in the region which goes back to the founding days of our business. the decision was informed by the geopolitical reality as well as operational realities.

as we have seen sanctions unfolding and payments partners of ours that we depend on to pay talent in the region pulling out of those markets, it has become operationally challenging for us to continue to deliver on our mission and our promise in the region. with those realities unfolding, it was clear what the right call was, even though it has been painful for us, because our goal is to serve these customers in every way possible. this is a tough one but we knew what the right decision was. emily: do you sympathize with the people in russia and belarus you may not want anything to do with this war but whose lives have been upended and livelihoods have been cut off as a result? hayden: absolutely. they and we find ourselves in a position that none of us could have imagined weeks ago. i think putin has set off this

chain of events that all of us are grappling with and it breaks our hearts. what we have been focused on is working around-the-clock to ensure our team members in the region are looked after, make sure our customers know that things like their profiles, all the work they put into building their reputations are line -- reputations online are safe and secure, or if they end up relocating and able to work in one of the other 180 countries where we are operational, they can continue working and not be impacted. we have been thinking of no one else but our customers. but we are impacted, as are they, and that has made this difficult. emily: what about your workers in ukraine? you are working to support them. how are you handling that?

hayden: we lost a feature where anyone can send money to workers in ukraine, buying a product from them and waiving the requirement that they deliver on the project, it is like the airbnb putting a home feature. we have been messaging our talent in the region that their reputation scores and profiles are safe and looked after so they will not be negatively impacted by disruptions. and we are working on other things that are targeting their safety and well-being, check ins that they can be doing with their clients outside of the region, as well as ourselves, donating $1 million to direct relief international. we have been doing things to make sure they feel supported and safe as much as we can as far as their ability to continue working if they can continue to do so. emily: if you have an interesting view on how global work patterns are shifting. every hour of this war is

different. what are you seeing? what is changing? hayden: it is a dynamic situation. we are hearing a lot of customers and businesses that we work with who have teams in the region either on upwork or their own employees on the ground are making swift decisions to move and relocate that talent and in many cases, the things we are doing are trying to help them with pay rolling and on boarding that talent to help them pay those people with continuity. in many cases, they are looking to spin up alternative talent in parallel. the are continuing to pay their people in the region, but also have business continuity with talent in other regions that can keep working even as there is uncertainty. those are some of the efforts we are helping our customers with

as they are trying to navigate through this time. emily: we will be continuing to monitor how you are handling the situation. thank you for giving us some context on your decision. coming up, the pandemic, the public health experts at the world health organization have learned -- bloomberg has learned they are discussing how and when to call an end to the pandemic. experts saying such a declaration would not just be a symbolic step, but add momentum to the rollback of pandemic era public health policies. drew armstrong will be here with more. this is bloomberg. ♪

emily: bloomberg has learned

that public health experts have begun discussing how and when to call an end the pandemic. drew armstrong joining us now. is this actually happening? is the pandemic near an end? drew: it is one of these things wherefore the pandemic to be at an end, that is going to be determined by human behavior and the virus. one of the things that happened early on, january 30, 2020, the food declared covid-19 -- the t who declared covid-19 a pandemic. that set off all of these actions on an international level that has since then become the norm. we have a global vaccine distribution program, countries have figured out how to approach public health restrictions. it has been an emergency for two

years, it has been the way of being. now they are talking about, what are the steps -- emily: are we at a point where this is starting to get worse again? drew: one of the truisms of this pandemic has been it does not start everywhere all at once in the same way and it is not going to end all at once. we see places like china and hong kong which have used different vaccines which may have different levels of efficacy. hong kong has had issues vaccinating some of their elderly and vulnerable populations. just because the pandemic feels

like it is over in some parts of the united states does not mean it is over everywhere. this will stutter along for quite a while. we will not be done with this, it will just reseed more into the background and come back to the foreground other times. emily: what would this emergency declaration actually mean in practice? drew: more than anything, these declarations are symbolic measures saying, we need to do something, trying to step up international court nation. it would be an acknowledgment that the structures are in place, things are working, and the who does have other things to focus on. emily: thank you for that update. coming up, tiktok and the war in ukraine, ukrainian users taking to the platform to tell tales of their lives and homes being destroyed, but also propaganda.

what to do about it? that is next. this is bloomberg. ♪

emily: welcome back to bloomberg technology, i'm emily chang in san francisco. as food prices rise around the world one company is not able to enjoy the benefits no thanks to a software switch. kriti gupta is here to explain. i'm told you will talk about avocados and i am intrigued. kriti: there is a tech angle, i promise. we are talking about food inflation. let's start with this, this is called guac shock, it shows

avocado prices are surging. 33% rise. this trickles into a lot of the food, the consumption in the united states. restaurants like aaa for example. but one company actually specializes in this, mission produce came out with earnings and said they were not able to reap all of the benefits. when you see higher food prices, companies like mission produce but grow avocados should be able to benefit. earnings should rise and they did in a way. revenue rose they've got more profit cotto, but their sales collapsed. he saw less volume, down by 18%. and all due to a sourcing mishap that happened thanks to a software glitch. there is your tech angle. we want to show you how hard it hit their margins. you saw the were doing pretty well, especially into this year when started to see higher food prices. but because of the switch to a different software, their margins collapsed. it tells you even for some of

these companies with a easy homerun, it comes down to how they are using the business software. today when oracle's earnings came out, you saw that business investments are key to their bottom line. a little bit of friday fun. it's avocados but it tech angle. emily: our producer suggested holy guacamole instead of guac shock, so if unique rate ideas, give her a call. i love avocados. that is a bummer. i want to move to tiktok, the app known priscilla videos -- for silly videos, dance moves and tutorials, it's being is to create more memes -- more memes and updates in crane. but also fake testimonials in an effort to influence things, the platform is trying to cope with how to deal with its role in

geopolitics. here is our guest. what do you make for how tiktok is being used for better and worse? >> when you think about tiktok, this is a billions all over the world are receiving news for the first time about the war, especially gen z. it can be used for good, just yesterday that white house brought 30 top tiktok is together to arm them with the right information about what is happening, how the u.s. is thinking about all it takes in what they should be talking about on their platforms. on the flipside, there is misinformation being spread on the platform and tiktok is doing the best they can to mitigate that in many ways, such as users and russia say they cannot live stream post on tiktok. so there is no one way to do it. but i do think making sure that you are arming tiktok creators with the right information is a great start. emily: the concern is that

tiktok serves a younger generation, and a younger generation around the world, are they going to have a wrong idea of what is going on in this work? meagan: -- war? meagan: it is good to see it from the perspective of younger users. there are gen z citizens on the ground talking at what is happening in the wars or even if you are reading news for the first time in an article, you can see the experiences from young people documenting it in their own way, gen z dark humor about the perspective of soldiers. that is hard to discount when you're seeing it from the perspective of people who are your and age -- own age. it's helpful to see and feel it from real-time from people who are experiencing it on the ground, they look like you. a week ago they were in school and now they are hiding in shelters and cooking meals for the first time. it makes it feel more real. those testimonials from ukraine

on tiktok have been powerful. what are you telling your portfolio about the environment, this global economic uncertainty, no one knowing how or if this war will end? meagan: early stage companies are production from this in many ways, so many of our companies are in this stage. so it is not as pressing for early-stage companies especially. but events like this are always impacting public markets. but given that we are long-term oriented investors, with any companies, focus is important in keeping focused for what your core objectives are as a founder, we try to guide them toward that as much as possible. emily: as you look into the future, you are looking to back the next big thing. do you see an opportunity for a platform that is more equitable and better at managing some of these complex issues? meagan: i'm a big believer in the

democratization of tools. were talking about backing companies that are building tools for creators, people who are making conversation in many ways and building brands and influence. the next generation of brands are all concentrators and many are gen z. so social platforms, companies building and web three and thinking about empowered ownership for users is important. on that front, looking at nexgen social platforms, especially in the context of web3 and how gen z can monetize in tone their content versus farming it out to platforms like tiktok or facebook or instagram. emily: you started a global community of gen z investors, founders, angels, students. what are your priorities? what are gen z's priorities in terms of what needs to be built and what should be billed?

-- built. ? meagan: the first part is knowledge, making sure everyone has equal opportunity to start business as founders and to invest in -- and have a say in the companies that are going to impact our generation. this week we launched an initiative to democratize startups. we saved money in getting started on day one. that is tangible impact where does not matter if your parents worked in finance, you have a college education, none of that should matter at the end of the day. so if i think about what we are doing in our mission, it is that aspect, through knowledge, opportunities, jobs and the initiative that we run for gen z vcs. having gen z being part of the conversation in starting businesses and investing, it will play a large role in what companies get funded, what businesses are started and how you incorporate that diverse

feedback around the table every step of the way. it's important that gen z is playing a role but we are making it more accessible to everyone. emily: the investor and foun der of gen z vcs, great to have you with us. coming up, more on president biden's executive order on crypto, we are joined by a former state party veteran and another guest for his take on role in the war in crane. this is bloomberg. ♪

emily: bitcoin is known for ebbs and flows, that after the past few days the asset is finishing the week in the same place it started. time for our crypto report with our contributor sonali basak. sonali: back to the beginning, lower than where we were a week ago. if you look earlier this week, we had a moment where bitcoin surpassed $42,000. that was a little over three days ago and we are still seeing a little bit of a lift, we do see bitcoin lower on the 24 hours period and over the last three days. so what are we looking at? we had all this excitement, where'd it go? and when you're talking about bitcoin, you look at the theorem as well, you see that when the bitcoin excitement

wanes, other coins have more of an outflow. you see a bigger drop-off in a theory of. -- ethereum. one thing that is stable is stable coins. want to draw attention because it has been stable through much of this crisis, but there is also news, there is a hedge fund on wall street trying to find a artificial way to short it is it faces notorious scrutiny. we talked about this for with marty chavez this week that stable coin regulation will be just as important as we think about crypto galatian overall. a lot of under answered -- unanswered questions and back to where we started. emily: stay with us, we will come back to present biden's exec of warner. our next guest was the head of global policy at entries in horowitz -- andreasen horowitz. he has worked with hillary

clinton, president biden, john kerry, former president obama and worked with world bank, m.i.t. and governments around the world. you have quite the resume. really curious for your thoughts on crypto and how it is being used in geopolitics, the spotlight on cryptocurrency given the war in ukraine and the concerns about it being used for illicit activities as well. what does this tell you? >> this is certainly a heartbreaking moment and our thoughts and prayers are with the people of ukraine. for us and many in the community, our primary concern is how to support the ukrainian people and nation in this moment of need. what we have seen over the last few weeks is an extraordinary swell of support. we have been in touch with a minister, greens deputy minister of digital transformation. he and others in the cranial government a few weeks back pled

to dutch pleaded to those around the world digital assets to support them. the posted jewel assets -- addresses for digital wallets and they have received 100 million dollars in support from individuals around the planet who for the first time in history can give help directly to assess the government and crisis in the context of this conflict. what we are seeing is that the ukrainian government is using those resources to purchase nonlethal equipment like body armor, rations, nightvision goggles, that are helping to keep people safe. it's also proving to be an incredibly important instrument in reserving data, distributed data networks providing safe haven for resources and information that would otherwise come under threat as a result of the russian invasion. they're also being used to preserve evidence of war crimes for future prosecution. certainly the first major conflict in which we have seen web three tools play a significant role, and

fortunately they seem to be proving very useful to the ukrainian people in this moment of crisis. emily: that point, there is concern crypto could be useful to the russians, wealthy russians could use cryptocurrency to circumvent sanctions. this at the time that president biden with this executive order is telling the u.s. government to do more research here, to figure out how the u.s. government should approach it. you seem optimistic about this executive order. why? >> the most support and thing, the most support and listen to as it relates to sanctions abasement is the efficient agency of the u.s. government that is responsible for tracking illicit financial flows. they came out a few days ago and said they are quite confident crypto assets and digital assets are not going to be used and are not being used for large-scale sanctions invasion. i have had many long discussions

with national security and law enforcement agencies this week. they are extremely comfortable with their ability to track illicit flows and feel that these instruments are not going to play a significant role in russia's ability to circumvent sanctions. broadly, the executive order presents a watershed moment for the community. this is the first time we have seen a serious whole of government effort on the part of the united states to launch a comprehensive conversation about what we want the future of the internet to entail. we think this is excellent news. what we are finding in our discussions with leaders in the administration and in congress is that those who take the time to really dig in and study the potential of these technologies come away very encouraged by the array of problems we have the potential to solve. sonali: i'm curious at something he started to mention earlier, the ability to get help and purchase nonlethal weapons. this fundraising at a massive

scale has drawn the attention of many communities, but i'm wondering about what the darkside could be. what would happen if some of this power to fund raise a garden into the wrong hands? -- fundraise had gotten into the wrong hands? >> it is a risk we need to be mindful of in the community. what we are seeing is that law enforcement and national security leaders are confident in their ability to manage and track illicit transactions that utilize digital assets. those who are engaging on behalf of those societies finding it valuable and they can help respond to the crisis. in 2008, i went in alone with joe biden to the capital georgia during the russian invasion of that country. as that city was ringed with russian armor, german biden and i started to put together plans

for a relief package that would assist the georgian people. and what we recognized on our way home is that it was going to be very tough to get the assets there and have confidence they would be used correctly. you will remember during iraq we used pallets of hundred dollar bills. this is a quantum leap forward in terms of our ability to transparently move assets into complex emergencies. sonali: really quickly, you mentioned the ability to trace potentially. is there evidence that the international -- the icc is able to use it? is there evidence that the international community is actually tracing were crimes the a blockchain technologies? tumicah: already advanced -- in advance of the conflict, you saw eaters in ukraine stockpiling thousands of sensitive documents

on this platform in order to facilitate future post-conflict rebuilding in the events that the hard copies of those documents would be restored -- destroyed. we think there is documentation of atrocities and war crimes utilizing that platform. it is a distributed architecture, which means it would be virtually impossible for the russians or other bad actors to eliminate this evidence. and it addresses what has historically been one of the greatest challenges in war crimes prosecution, which is how do you maintain this from the time the atrocities committed to the time you're able to bring charges? emily: we will have to continue this at another time. fascinating things. tumicah tillermann with the new cryptocurrency, we will follow you and our contributor sonali basak. , that -- coming up, the trial

for the former their nose president and ex-boyfriend. what it means furloughs with homes -- four elizabeth holmes as she awaits trial. next. ♪

emily: as the founder of fair notice awaits sentencing, her ex-boyfriend and former president begins his trial wednesday. she has accused him of abuse and the outcome of his trial could give us an indication of the potential sentencing for holmes. i want to get details from joe rosenblatt who is at the courthouse every day. how could this case impact what happens with holmes'sentence given that the verdict has come down?? joel: the verdict has come down

but delayed our sentencing for an important reason. if he wants to see what role her boyfriend plays in all of it. his trial begins tuesday, opening arguments begin tuesday, jury selection is underway as we speak. what role he played factors into the judge's sentencing of elizabeth holmes. so depending on what he finds about whether she was more involved than the trial showed or less, or whether balwani was behind the scenes doing more as she alleged, whether she believes some of the allegations she leveled at him, that factors into his sentence of elizabeth holmes. emily: interesting. reminder to viewers, there were multiple charges she was found guilty of, multiple that she was

found not guilty of and multiple charges that the jury could not come to a conclusion on. they were at an impasse. what happens with those other charges? how will the judge and this trial handle those differently? joel: that's very interesting. they were indicted as co-conspirators. they were boyfriend and girlfriend, they were president and ceo. many people assume at this point that they were as thick as thieves. and that ball wanting -- balwani faces the same trial. i don't think that is quite the case. the charges that elizabeth holmes was vindicated of i think will inform this trial. for example, the jury in her trial found she was not guilty at all of defrauding patients. well balwani was much more in

charge of the laboratories, so he was closer to the results many employees said were fake and not true. so whether or not those charges of patient fraud or how the government presents those cases and how he defends against them will be different in this trial. i think it's going to be a more important part of the trial. emily: interesting. we will be watching for your coverage starting next week. our joel rosenblatt thank you. that does it for this edition of bloomberg technology. i'm heading to austin this weekend for south by southwest. we will bring you some of my interviews next week on the show. have a wonderful weekend. this is bloomberg. ♪

david: the world looks on in horror as russia intensifies its attacks on ukraine. this is wall street week. i'm david westin. larry summers on the washington embargo on russian oil. larry: if higher prices of gasoline are the price of freedom, it is a price that this generation of americans should pay. david: the ceo of equity group investors on what war in ukraine has made on investable -- uninv estable. >>