it's just bouncing on the moving average so i think it's a good entry point right here >> okay. dr. j? >> terarah data. i like it. i bought it. >> the etf better known as joe t. >> amd stay with it, scott. don't stay out of it buy high, sell higher. >> good to see you "the exchange" starts now. thank so much scott. i'm eamon javers sitting in for kelly evans. china's crackdown costing its own companies $1 trillion in market cap but now saying it wants to work the s.e.c. on ipos does that mean there's value in chinese listed companies right now. most industries are deal being a worker shortage. but for cyber security it comes at a particularly critical time. how can u.s. companies defend themselves without the people to do it. and in rapid fur, food,

fashion, and tax evasion, hopefully not all at the same time plus the dire consequences of new rules in california. you may not be able to find bacon. the markets nearing all-time highs. let's start with dom chu and the numbers. >> the numbers are pretty positive right now but not as positive as earlier in the session. for the s&p 500 to give you an idea of the range, we're at 4,400, that big figure here, up about 5 or 6 points. at the highs of the day we were up 27 handles, 27 points, and down one of the lows we're tilting toward the end of the lower end of the trading range at least for now the nasdaq up about one-third of 1% 34,975 in the dow. if you take a look at the last month the leadership in the market is coming from places that the bulls don't find as bullish. if you look at real estate and utilities, the two best performing sectors on a one-month basis, meanwhile energy down 9.5% here on these

the athletic apparel maker is up 4.5% thanks to an upbreak in a catalyst trading perspective analysts say go boo it they have a tilt towards looking to buy into that particular trading catalyst they think it's been an underperformer to nike, which it has been over the last few months there could be a catch-up trade there, so watch under armor. an underperformer that could be catching up according to baird i'll send things back to you >> maybe a come from behind victory like we saw in the oeps over the weekend let's move to the crackdown in china beijing is calling for better

regulations in the u.s investors are optimistic about that sentiment, pushing asian markets higher today after last month's sell off euni eunice uniis live with the details. tell us what's going on there. >> thanks, eamon china wants more communication and coordination, specifically when it comes to listings or potential listings for chinese firms. the csrc hosted a statement on its website over the weekend suggesting that the two sides should find a, quote, proper resolution and this is after the s.e.c. had said that it happened to see additional disclosures from chinese companies before they potentially list after all of the uncertainty from beijing's regulatory crackdowns. now, in this statement, the csrc's key points are china is open to ipos at home and overseas but the companies should comply with rules

the new policies are meant to sustain policies and improve communication for greater predictability media have been echoing these remarks, also stressing that china does not want to see decoupling it wants to cooperate. however, what i found interesting is that the coordination is seen as on the policy side as opposed to any mention about the accounting issues that the two regulators have had this is, as you all know, eamon, a long-time issue between these two regulatory bodies. now, coming up this week, new oriental and tal, private tutoring firms, were supposed to be announcing earnings on tuesday and thursday those earnings reports have been postponed because of all this regulatory uncertainty eamon? >> eunice, can you drill down for us and explain what the

chinese government means when they talk about a cyber security investigation. we've seen before them say we want to pause and take a look. in the u.s. you might say the government has a concern that the company might be leaking too much information but when the chinese government says they're conducting a cyber security investigation into a company, what do they mean by that >> in this case the cyber watchdog has said they want to make sure that the chinese data that's out there is going to be in line with national security so, for example, with didi, this is a huge investigation that's currently underway with didi with coordinating seven different ministries a lot of the concern is that didi has been described as this treasure trove of data with access to information about the whereabouts and travel plans for hundreds of millions of chinese, which some people say includes chinese officials and that this could be potentially a concern

if it falls into -- from the chinese perspective -- the wrong hands. eamon? >> and quickly, eunice, on that point when they say it needs to be in line with national security, are they saying they want the data themselves the chinese government is saying you've got to give us this data or else you can't do business in this country >> well, the chinese might already have that data, but they're saying they want to make sure that this data doesn't get accessed by the wrong people so, for example, looking at vendors and supply chains, closing up loopholes in that way. what i thought was interesting, if you look at the ministries that are going in for the investigation, it's not like the tax and market regulators who can look at the books for the ipo, the prospectus, but it's also the national resources ministry, the transport ministry so, there's been a lot of speculation that that means that china wants to make sure its logistics network is completely in line, that a lot of the mapping issues that it might

have, that there might be some questions that people would have about exactly what china looks like and china doesn't necessarily want the u.s. or any other -- from china's perspective -- adversary to see what the map of china actually looks like or that logistics network >> fascinating stuff eunice yoon in beijing thanks so much to you. with china indicating it may be willing to work with regulators, are chinese companies investible the slide provides great opportunities, says my next guest, provided you're not afraid of the risks. joining me is simian howard. what does that mean provided you're willing to deal with the list >> the risk of government action in china is a real one their efforts to kind of push a little bit of private benefit or perhaps a little bit more towards the public side is a real one but there are limits

and as an example of sort of perhaps the rhetoric theme or the bark theme more than the bite, bilateral trade between the u.s. and china hit all-time highs. that's after just a little bit of a pullback at the beginning of the pandemic. so, you see the rhetoric softening. so, there are certainly limits to being able to create a competitive economy with regards to how far you push that envelope and of course it's not a surprise to see investors come in because we're looking at evaluations, example csi-300 at relative multiples we haven't seen in over a decade. perhaps the risk is priced in. >> one of the companies you've spotlighted is alibaba, which you say is trading at a significant discount maybe you could flip the argument and say it should be traded at a discount you don't know where the chinese government is going to step in you heard eunice listing the different concerns that the chinese government has about the

data the companies have. if you're investing in alibaba, how do you know when the next big foot is going to come clamping down? >> you never know. >> right >> but it is a question of what the level of that discount is. and right now alibaba is trading at about two-thirds of a discount, so, about 65% discount to the s&p 500 consumer discretionary sector by the way, if you take a basket of the chinese ecommerce companies that as an example we hold in our approach like retail index, as a group they're trading at a similar two-thirds discount to the s&p 500 discretionary sector so, at some point folks will step in. and that's what we saw u.s. investors do and i think at this level of valuation, it's not a terrible idea you're also at a discount overall to the index if you're looking to do something outside of the u.s. for diversification purposes, you know, that great big european discount, china's on

sale cheaper now >> if you've made your case and i'm an investor watching you talk about this, what are the other names you like in that space. if you're looking for chinese names and you think, i'm willing to take that risk on, where do you go >> well, we're fans of the index. so, i would say the basket makes a lot of sense so, you've got opportunities -- >> so, you wouldn't play individual names in china? you would go with the indexes? >> i think you're better off with a basket because, again -- particularly as you note the regulatory issues, they're not always coming down as a precise same time for all the times that are involved you do see some ini diosyncratic risk relative to the government's involvement it seems prudent to managing the regulatory risk. >> if you're in china do you want to be in technology and

ecommerce or are other sectors >> you're still talking about tech and ecommerce as being one of the biggest pieces. we think that's not a terrible way to play this from a broader perspective, it's one of the great tail winds of broad market so, as an example, we know globally the penetration of ecommerce is quite low even in the u.s., it's only about 13%. and even if you look at the u.s. online retail space, it's trading at a discount, which is kind of odd to think about given the tail winds to the growth of that sector. so, it's certainly not a bad choice, taking the broad index is not a bad choice either but we would be fans of focusing on ecommerce as well >> great discussion there. thank you so much. si simeon hyman the two year suspension of the debt ceiling has expired and the treasury department is taking extraordinary measures -- it's that time again -- to avoid

hitting the borrowing limit. senate negotiators have finalized language for the trillion dollar infrastructure deal so, here to drill down on all the implications for wall street, lindi cantrell, head of public policy at pemco it's millions of provisions in there possibly do you have any sense of what's in this infrastructure bill and what it's going to do and where the sticking points might still be >> good afternoon. this is usually, as you know, the first two weeks of august are usually quite quiet in washington that is not -- >> not this year >> it's not the case this year again, as you said, we finally got the legislative text, and of course the devil will be in the details. but the largely, eamon, this is very much as predicted this funds traditional infrastructure, roads and bridges, also broadband and

water infrastructure and as you know, this is bipartisan and this is very much a priority for president biden. it was something that he campaigned on. our expectation is that this will ultimately pass both chambers of congress and be signed into law probably by the end of september, if not a little bit sooner. so, big win for him for all intents and purposes >> this might be the only bipartisan thing that can happen in washington this year. in the post-january 6th era, polarization is so intense, more than i've seen it in my career and yet biden campaigned on being able to do something in a bipartisan way looks like he might be on the verge of getting that. i wonder if you look from an investor perspective, all this is down the line shovel ready doesn't mean shovel ready. there's nothing that's shovel ready. when you're an investor and look at this, enormous amount of money coming for infrastructure,

roads, ports, airports, all that stuff, but how do you play it? do you look at individual stocks and say i can buy that now because it's coming in the out years. >> that's a great point. from economic perspective, it's exactly right. this all has very long lags. much of the is going to be predicated on the states actually deploying this money. so, this is unlikely to get into the economy immediately, as you point out. at the same time, a lot of this fiscal stimulus that we've seen has been very front loaded, whether it's the stimulus payments or unemployment insurance or the eviction moratorium all those things are now coming to an end. so, there is actually this sort of fiscal cliff. this will -- infrastructure bill will -- likely mitigate to some extent the impact of that. but for sure this is going to be played out over the course of years, not being front loaded like we've seen with the covid

relief there will still be this fiscal cliff we will experience in 2022 as a result from an economic forecasting perspective, our gdp forecast, i take that into consideration. >> what do you make of the era after the bipartisan good feelings moments in washington if they get the bill passed? the democrats are talking about another $3 trillion in spending on a whole host of things, early education, things to improve lifestyles and outcomes in the united states. they're going to have to do that on a strictly party line vote. they're going to look for the 50 vote margin in order to do that in the senate. is that likely, in your view and again, from an investor's perspective, what do you think in terms of stocks you want to play looking at that enormous amount of spending that could be coming down the pike later in the year >> so, we've been pretty optimistic that this dual track process that was previewed several months ago would come to

fruition now we're seeing the first leg of that with this bipartisan bill and as you point out now it's going to be in some ways even more difficult for democrats to find unanimity around some of the not hard infrastructure but more soft infrastructure, things like child care and universal pre-k and health care and what have you our view is you will see something passed but it won't be this $3.5 trillion figure that has been previewed our expectation is more in the sort of $1.5 to $2 trillion ball park, still will have some sort of lags and become more incremental certainly than what the covid relief bill than we've seen over the last year or so. and it will probably be offset to some extent by, you know, tax increases. and i think from a market's perspective, that's what the market will really be focused

on where does the corporate tax rate plan? how does the increase in individual rate effect demand? those are the things that are going to be the markets. we are optimistic that you will see something, but it will be more than funnel form. >> the democrats aren't going to get everything they want, but they might get something libby cantrell, thanks so much for joining us today to get a list of the stocks as the infrastructure bill is set to pass, ed had to cnbc.com/pro for that. coming up here, a cyber tech will dig into the struggles when it comes to defending themselves a closer look at the job hunt for hackers is next. plus the ceo of bridgestone joins us to talk about the tire company's new tech bed, the delta variant and the speed bumps it's seeing in the supply chain. "the exchange" is back right after this

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welcome back to "the exchange." even as american companies are getting clobbering by the hackers, they're struggling to find people to fight against them, so much so that the demand for cyber workers hit an all-time high this quarter in the second quarter of 2021

alone, there were more than 183,000 job postings for cyber employees. of those, well over 7,000 open jobs were in government and more than 175,000 were in the private sector part of the problem is that there isn't a big enough pipeline of students going into cyber security careers so, joining me now to figure out what the do about all this is barbara mazza. tell me what you're seeing in terms of this job shortage overall and how you bring more people into this sector. >> great well, thanks for having us here for this really important discussion so, what we're seeing is the tactics, techniques and procedures that cyber attackers use have become increasingly unpredictable. and this has meant adopting outside of the box thinking with regards to the cyber defenders that we are seeking to hire. so, while traditional college systems absolutely play an important role in growth and

development, they can't be the only place that we go to find and nurture cyber security talent hands-on experience that can be gained via certification programs, cyber competitions, training programs carry tremendous value for problem solving against today's emerging threats. >> but so many of these jobs, barbara, require a four-year degree, right? i majored in political science in undergrad i don't think that would necessarily qualify me for a cyber security job i think maybe it didn't qualify me for any job it certainly didn't qualify me for a cyber security job why is that still happening? >> so, i think quite frankly, companies need to move such as we have much more briskly into the land of removing the degree requirements -- >> altogether? >> -- altogether there are some positions where you made kneed a four-year degree, but what we're finding

is we need much more of the problem solving, critical thinking and out of the box skill sets versus just that four-year degree for a career successful in cyber. >> how do you test for that? the four-year degree was a credential that said this person took the s.a.t.s at some point, graduated high school, made it to college, showed up to class they're responsible citizens, graduated college. we know at least that. if you're talking about doing away with that, what do you do do you give the people a test on site do you bring them in and say run some code for us and we'll see how you do >> you do things about show me your work. show me how you would solve this problem. show me how you would reverse engineer this piece of code. and there's also certification programs and what we found is that in this environment where the problems require so much more agility to solving them, sometimes those short form

programs have been equally impactful showing us they have the capability to solve those problems >> one of the things they say is this industry in particular is overwhelmingly white and male and there's a real lack of diversity in cyber security. and the challenge is figuring out how to weed out all the unintended perhaps bias in the job listings and other ways of recruiting to bring in a bigger funnel in terms of who you're bringing into the industry how do you do that in real terms? >> bingo bingo. that was one of the big drivers for us, removing the degree requirements for our positions as well. we really sought a much larger talent pool. and often times those diverse candidates, they don't have a path to a four-year degree so, we're concentrating more of our time at regional technical institutes, community college, cert programs, training and finding people at conferences.

so, that has opened up the aperture significantly on our ability to tap into far more broad diverse pipelines, which is good for all of us, not just solving cyber issues but good for humanity and the right thing to do. >> all these private sector companies rely on the government, rely on fbi, nsa and all those three letter agencies we talk about. and yet the government itself is struggling with this issue and trying to figure out how they can bring in people. one of the statistics we heard that was so fascinating to me is that the federal government is paying $63,000 a year for these entry level cyber security jobs. the private sector, they're making $100,000 a year it's a huge difference how can the federal government get people to take that kind of a pay differential and come work for the good guys, so to speak, against the foreign hackers around the world who are trying to destroy american private industry >> it's a great question you know, i think we have an

opportunity to do much public-private partnerships. that's something we've kind of tested the waters with on a small scale. those that go into service, you know, they're very mission oriented, rightly so and i think we in the private sector have an opportunity to play a bigger role in helping do some of that talent exchange, information and knowledge sharing and kind of joint training so that those that do want to go in and provide service have the opportunity to experience and do that knowledge exchange more so than public-private does today by way of talent exchange and that's something that has opportunity we're just starting to explore >> barbara, thank you so much. coming up, one wall street firm is initiating this stock with a buy saying it's ahead of the curve on shifting fashion trends plus reese witherspoon's company is selling a majority stake to a firm backed by

private equity and some hollywood veterans will have all the details of this big little media deal when we come back ♪all by yourself.♪ you look a little lost. i can't find my hotel. oh. oh! ♪♪ this is not normal. no. ♪♪ so? ♪♪ right? go with us and find millions of flexible options, all in our app. expedia. it matters who you travel with.

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ge is trading at 100 bucks a trade, that's because the ge has cut the shares outstanding from 9 billion to just over 1 billion. now over to rahel solomon for a cnbc news update >> in southern florida, there is surging demand for vaccinations. dozens of cars been seen waiting at vaccination sites in hialeah and fort lauderdale as covid hospitalizations in florida hit an all-time high we'll have the latest in the outbreaks coming up later in the show starting tomorrow, target will require workers to wear masks at stores and counties with high risks. target joining walmart which issued similar rules last week chum schumer say it is infrastructure bill should get passed this week because it has support from both parties, although minority leader mitch mcconnell says the amendment process shouldn't be rushed. on "the news" tonight, the

fight to get the infrastructure bill enacted before the senate leaves town. that airs tonight at 7:00 p.m. eastern. thanks so much bullish on a high waist and wide leg, robinhood attracts retail investors and californians might consider stocking up on a breakfast staple mm, mm,good. we'll explain all that when "the exchange" comes right back at the today we're going to fine tune the dynamic braking system whoo, what a ride! i invested in invesco qqq a fund that invests in the innovators of the nasdaq 100 like you you don't have to be a deep learning engineer to help make the world a smarter place does this come in blue? become an agent of innovation with invesco qqq

. all right. let's catch you up on stories that should be on your radar it's time for rapid fire first up, levi's getting a boost today after steeple initiating the apparel company with a buy, saying that post-covid secular trends are moving toward wider and looser jeans and higher waisted styles for women, changes that levi's has been ahead of the curve on -- see what we did there? shares are up 40% on the day and on the year. dom, you're the most fashionable

guy in the segment what do you think of this? >> i think rob and gina both have me outdone on the fashion front. what i did will say is we've been talking about the trend in mom jeans or so-called mom jeans for a while now, and levi's is putting stake behind it. if it's the beginning of a trend, it's a wardrobe refresh cycle. it could have legs for a while >> have legs >> you see what i did, right you said curves. >> that was written. that was written that's in the prompter they have a team of writers. you did that off the top of your head i like that. >> here's what i would say it's an interesting point here, if you look at the way levi's is run, it's running so far, maybe it's overvalued. it's trading just about 20 times next year's estimating earnings so that puts it a hair below where the market is now. so, maybe there is a little something to this idea that

levi's has room to run >> i've seen people since covid talking about jeans are now formal wear. used to be you dressed down in jeans. now i see people complaining and saying, i don't want to dress up anymore. i don't want to put on jeans and go back to work. are jeans the new semiformal where are we at? >> absolutely. the casual went down to yoga pants. that's a step up from yoga pants. >> that's a step up from no pants, which is what i heard people were doing on zoom. >> that's true that was the first level of the pandemic >> we can always descend further. >> exactly but then we went to yoga pants and now we're in jeans jeans, if you're talking about thigh brid work, you have to go into the office every so often and you don't want to look like you're wearing yoga pants, levi's works at 20 times forward earnings, they are really not superovervalued. and comfort is the style for probably the next 12 to 24

months >> they never got me in a pair of skinny jeans and now they never will robinhood announcing more than 300,000 users participated in the ipo last week. that represents about 1.3% of all funded accounts on the platform, as much as 25% of allocations. they don't get to participate in this thing it's a good thing that retail investors got into this one on robinhood, but on the other hand it went down on the first day. is that a win or a loss? >> well, i think largely it's a win. i think the attention on the retail investor on this ipo is probably overblown it is a large number, 300,000

investors. that's a decent amount but people who are using the analogy of amc, for instance, of the new retail revolution in shareholders, i just don't think they really hit the mark with robinhood. if you look at robinhood, those shareholders have less than 2% of the market cap. it's about $500 million owned by these retail investors with the market cap of about $30 billion. it's not a lot you compare that with amc where those 4 million shareholders own about 80% of the company it's good. it's great to have your customers participating on ipo it's good for marketing, but it's not like amc where those retail investors are the company and driving that forward >> gina, what do you make of the trend? is this a meme stock or a semimeme stock, maybe? and what about the issue of the insiders in this company selling their shares robinhood has held out as a company that's good for the

little guy, good for retail investors, part of revolution in trading. yet you see the same thing happening where the insiders are selling tens of millions of dollars of stock on the first day. does that hurt the image of the company with its base? >> whether it hurts the image of the company with its base, the point of their ipo was that i don't think they could actually place as much stock as they would have wanted to with the actual institutional investors who tend to be more buy and hold and tend to create more stability in the first days of trading. so, because they were sort of going for this retail feel, it had a retail feel, which is very bumpy. and the reality is that i think their entire business model comes into question when you look at the fact that they still participate and pay for order flow, which is to say that they're taking all of those retail trades and they're selling them on to big institutions so, let's not get too overzealous about what's actually going on here and i would say that that's the

reason that the institutions were probably not that keen on it because they don't believe the business model >> next up the infrastructure bill making its way through a traffic jam in congress. again, see what you did there? and as lawmakers pay for the increase in spending, a crypto tax crackdown has made its way into the bill tax. there's always some final thing in there robin, you've been following this one tell us what's going on. >> that little thing snuck in last week and people are kind of just waking up to it now what it does, it raises about $28 billion of that $550 billion in new spending from cracking down on crypto tax evasion right now it's kind of an honor system, where if you hold crypto or if you're a crypto exchange you kind of have to voluntarily report it to the irs and we know what happens when taxes are voluntary. very few people pay it if you talk to the irs chief, he said, look, we think a large reason for the $1 trillion in uncollected taxes every year is

crypto tax evasion what this does is forces reporting by coin baits and all the exchanges, and it also defines any company that facilitates the transfer of digital assets that's the important phrase. they will have to comply so, it's a much broader definition of who will have to comply and now they're going to have to report all of this and all their customer information to the irs. and presumably that's going to raise more money we'll just have to see >> presumably. dom, you and i were talking in the newsroom about this just before the show. you told me about something very sneaky but very legal that people are doing about lost harvesting i thought that was fascinating explain what's going on there. >> we've been talking about this for a few months now, the idea these are cryptocurrencies not treated like securities. they're treated like collectibles, which means you're not bound by the same watch sell rules. you could sell crypto for a loss and immediately buy it and back and still book those losses.

in essence what this tells you is the tax law around cryptocurrencies is still very much in the early stages and that many of these government officials are going to have to find a way to play catch up in some way eamon, this is a very love-hate relationship because the more you have government regulators looking for at least a little piece of the pie, so to speak, the more it does tend to legitimize the cryptocurrency infrastructure, the ecosystem, and maybe even the assets and coins themselves so, certainly something to watch. >> gina, your take on this as we talk about the honor system in tax payment. that's probably not a good way for the government to raise revenue, right so, what do we do? >> no. no, it's not and i think the element -- there's several interesting elements about what they're trying to do but one is the required reporting to the irs for any crypto transaction over $10,000. that will certainly make it, you know, more challenging for at least large transactions to evade taxes. and that's good. but the thing is that the crypto space really is floating on all

the access liquidity that's happening in the economy as we start to gear back up as an economy and start to see interest rates start to rise, it may not be for 12 or 24 months, but it will happen it's going to take a lot of the wind out of the sails on crypto. >> that's it for us on "rapid fire." reran out of time for bacon but california could be facing a shortage we had a great segment, a lot of puns on this the writers have been doing overtime thanks to all of you from new mask guidance to the fda and the pressure to improve cce,vain the roundup in the latest covid head locks.

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for covid hospitalizations today, this as the fda is being pressured to grant full approval to covid-19 vaccines meg terrell joins us now to explain. >> eamon, the delta variant is really causing this major surge in cases across the country. they were up more than 400% since july 1st, recording an average of more than 72,000 per day. on friday we hit 100,000 daily cases reported to the cdc. hospitalizations are also higher new admissions now more than 6,000 nationally deaths are up 40% in the last month to more than 300 people dying from covid every day across the country infection rates are spreading everywhere now 80% almost of counties in the u.s. either in high or substantial transmission subject to mask guidance you can see the red there. that is high transmission. but particularly in florida, seeing those record numbers of hospitalizations rising again today to 10,389.

that is higher than the peak that they saw in july 2020 talk about deja vu happening now. on "morning joe" this morning, the president of the florida hospital association joined to talk about the kinds of trends they're seeing we've been thinking about this as a disease that affects older people she said that's not the case anymore. >> right now we know that this is absolutely affecting a younger population in jacksonville, one of our hospitals, their average age now is 42 years old. we have 25 year olds who are in the hospital in intensive care on ventilators >> reporter: so, eamon, these scary numbers do seem to be causing some folks to roll up their screens and get their shots. the white house's data coordinator for covid just announcing the country has hit that goal of 70% of u.s. adults having at least one shot that was of course the goal by july 4th but you can see there people getting their first shots has

ticked up about 30% week-over-week may eamon? >> thanks meg. from semiconductors to lumber to rubber, the pandemic has produced a shortage of key components we'll talk to paolo ferrari about all of that and the company's most recent acquisition. "the exchange" coming right back something different. oh, we can help with that. okay, imagine this... your mover, rob, he's on the scene and needs a plan with a mobile hotspot. we cut to downtown, your sales rep lisa has to send some files, asap! so basically i can pick the right plan for each employee... yeah i should've just led with that... with at&t business... you can pick the best plan for each employee and only pay for the features they need.

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and welcome back to "the exchange." manufacturers are facing a rubber shortage as leaf ro ravages crops. bridgestone is attempting to innovate its way out, investing more in tech, announcing startup azuga whose software tracks delivery drivers with us for an exclusive interview is paolo ferrari, the ceo of bridgestone america thank you for being here explain the strategy here. is the future of the tire business actually in the data business >> well, first, i want to thank you for having me. it's great to be with you. yes, it is an exciting time for us at bridgestone. we are, of course, the number one ire, rubber manufacturer i the world. contributing to our new vision,

which is to provide value for the customer as a sustainable solutions company in this broader new mobility system where fleet are taking more and more of a leading role so, of course, we'll continue to provide tires to companies, but we also want to be more relevant more relevant meaning also producing and delivering more solutions for more sustainable mobility, safer mobility, and it is also thanks to the access of data coming from a very vast customer base. yes, the future is in tires connected to the vehicles. >> talk to me about your supply issues we're seeing this across industries in the nearly post-covid economy as companies are struggling to bring everything in through the different choke points but in the rubber space you have a different challenge. a rubber pandemic due to some natural diseases affecting some

of the rubber plants how are you doing getting the supplies in to get products out the door >> i have to say clear market is strong and we're doing well and mobility has bounced back. we're in a really good space from that point of view. luckily we haven't really had any supply shortage issues supply is tight like it is for everyone, but we haven't seen anything as complicated. of course we fully support them in that. supply has been relatively good. we haven't had any issues in production and, of course, selling and producing our own products yes, in general we are working diligently to continue to study alternative sources to natural rubber which will be there for the foreseeable future we're invested in technology, recycling, also a very interesting project you may have read in arizona. so leveraging a different kind

of plant which also generates rubber in a different way. i think we're managing the short term well and moving forward. >> thank you so much for being here fascinating conversation, paolo ferrari of bridgestone up next, the details of reese witherspoon's nearly $1 billion entertainment deal this may look like a regular movie night. but if you're a kid with diabetes, it's more. it's the simple act of enjoying time with friends, knowing you understand your glucose levels. ♪♪ if your money is working toward the same goals, why keep it in different places? sofi is a one-stop shop for your finances designed to work better together. spend with sofi and get cash back rewards that automatically go toward your goals. like investing in stocks, etfs, and crypto. that's better together. or pay down your sofi debt sooner. that's better together. and that's how sofi is helping millions

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and welcome back reese witherspoon's production company hello sunshine selling to a new black stone-based venture. julia boorstin is here with all the details. julia, what's the deal here? >> reporter: well, eamon, it's another mega deal that speaks to the growing value of premium content particularly for streamers. now reese witherspoon's hello sunshine is selling to a new entertainment company that is backed by blackstone run by kevin mayer and tom staggs and backed by blackstone this female-focused company $900 million. a source close to the situation says they are buying out current

investors including at&t reese witherspoon and hello sunshine ceo sarah harden will join the board of this new still unnamed company and will continue to run hello sunshine hello sunshine produces and sells female-driven content across platforms and has a strong record turning books into bestsellers and into hits such as "the morning show," "big little lies" and "little fires everywhere" on hulu. the price tag for the company speaks to the appeal of their female-focused content and the fact there just aren't that many independent studios left out there that can sell content across platforms as most studios are tied up with serving their own streaming platforms. eamon? >> and, julia, that brings up the question with all those independent studios out there who could be acquired next in the wave of acquisitions we may or may not be seeing

>> reporter: well, look, i think this is all part of the media consolidation we've seen with the discovery deal and the mgm by amazon. the $1 billion change and lebron james has been working on growing his media company. and there's also, of course, questions whether lionsgate and stars might make sense >> and they're buying this company for its female-centric content but it will be run by two men, right >> well, look, i have to say sarah harden and reese witherspoon will be on the board of the company and will operate their company independently. the tom staggs/mayer leadership will be looking at other acquisitions this is part of a media venture blackstone is backing. it will be interesting to see

what other assets they might be looking at to fold in, some content that could be complementary or similar as they build up the new media company they're working on >> julia, thanks for that fascinating conversation that does it for "the exchange." "power lunch" with tyler mathison and courtney reagan right now. welcome. good to see you. >> thank you it's nice to be here >> ahead this hour, a payments powerhouse, square and afterpay marking an old-fashioned way of lenning. we'll talk to a top analyst who says the buy now, pay later phenomenon could set off a new wave >> the infrastructure bill includes $73 billion piece for grid updates is washington on the verge of giving the sector a boost? >> and is china still investable why that country's business crackdown could threaten its standing as an economic superpower