so i feel it's a very fertile site. >> reporter: schwartzman is actually not a poet herself. teaches architecture and design at columbia university and barnard college. but she says she has always been fast naeted by how people connect in public spaces like trains. she says while commuting one day last spring, the idea to ask strangers to write poems hit her with a funk. she had the first participants write in her iphone. later that day, she bought her first notebook for the project. >> person-to-person, it's hand-to-pen. it's pen-to-paper. and i'm almost thinking, it's so powerful that i wonder if that is something really we're missing. like, why shouldn't we talk to strangers? why shouldn't the train be a party? why are there so many boundaries? >> reporter: now with more than 100 entries, she is on notebook number five. >> some days it's torture. like, if i'm having a bad day, i think to myself at that time, why did i do this and how do i do this? this will never happen again. and then the next day or later on the way home, it's easy again. >> reporter: why do you think yo

could schwartzman scholars become bigger than what it already is? >> at the moment, -- did not think $300 million was enough. >> he is right, he is always right. we have increased the fund raising to $350 million because it's more expensive. we are busy recruiting professors and building a building. condoleezza rice was just there yesterday and i got these anderful pictures of condi a hard hat walking around. she is one of our advisory directors and a terrific person. there is a bunch to do to get to the point where the big admissions process is modeled off of the rhodes with admissions panels and we will have students there in two years. my wife would not be in favor of an additional program in another particularly one that does not speak english as a first language. this has been a fascinating thing. here today, there is a famous professor i will spend time with in a private meeting to see if he would go to china. ♪and teach a course. e. the problem is when you sleep. the business does not stop and the short and scholars is an overlay. it is turni

the first person we sat down with was team schwartzman. concerned --e is are concerned about the global economy. do you feel like he is not as concerned as everybody else's. >> steve is playing in the private markets. those investments take a lot longer to mature. whether he feels relaxed or not it is not easy to move illiquid assets if you are a black so -- if you are a blackstone group and one of the things we talked about was russia. impossible not to talk about russia. steve sits on an international advisory panel. that is a position he still holds. i want you to hear steve schwarzman talking about the rifts in russia and how he plans to respond. >> i think in the short term, other than if you are a market operator, which we are not, we buy assets on a longer-term basis as a rule in most of our businesses. it is time to watch. this can have a variety of from going back to business as usual or lurching off into some other direction. to make markets to make money. who is on the other side of the market? steve tannenbaum. at where gasu lo

when we come back eye live interview with steve schwartzman.e right back. [ bagpipes play ] make it happen with fidelity active trader pro. it's one more innovative reason serious investors are choosing fidelity. call or click to open your fidelity account today. >>> keep your eye on bfa. spending the buybacks at the open traded 21 million shares before the bell. 20% of the average daily volume. >> sure when they found out they fold people, told the fed. but it will be a damaged stock for a long time. special guest good morning brian. >> good morning karl. guys thank you very much. stephen schwartzman well-known to our viewers. he joins us bright and early. welcome. it is the one year anniversary of your program in china. you funded that couple of hundred million dollars. i have to ask you there are a story today. leon black paying his partners in staock instead of cash. >> most people need cash to live. it has been my experience. and so we want to 100% stock. and you know the stock is probably more on the people already ownp a lot of stock. a

schwartzman will join them in the 10:00 hour. nouriel roubini, nyu.., "bloomberg surveillance," let's get to some morning movers. it is a frenzy of dealmaking out there. apart as deals falling well. newmont mining has ended its merger talks with barrick gold in canada. the two had agreed to a merger and had planned to announce the before the plans broke off. newmont is now ship -- now saying that shareholder interests are best served by staying independent. in the past they attempted to get together. >> back in 2000. and it did not work. >> explain this transaction, please. .> so, that was the gold there was another one that just came out, forest labs agrees to buy furious for up to 1.4 $6 billion in cash. what is curious about this, recall, activists are buying forest labs for about $20 million. forest labs is the target being acquired, now that target went out to buy someone else. by the way, f rx has activists support on the purchase deal. so, the people buying forest approval of the merger? orthe fifth pharmaceutical bio for the deal we have had i

steve schwartzman's firm, 70 cents per share. total of $814 million.raded company. so a lot of different numbers to choose from. pepsi earlier. lots and lots and lots. morgan stanley killed it. i'm surprised the markets are turned down. >> it was the strongest three-day run we have seen in quite some time. a lot of volatility. not just earnings driving things right now. you had comments by fed chair yellen. that's one of the reasons the major markets yesterday enjoyed a really strong rally. phil orlando, chief equity market strategist at federated. great to see you this morning. >> thanks for having me back. >> what do you think is driving the market? >> well, certainly the yellen lunch was a good lunch yesterday. i was there with 2,000 of my closest friends. i think she made two important points. number one, she didn't repeat the rookie mistake she made last month at her first press conference. no six-month discussion. she was greenspan-esque. i think she went out of her way to talk about the no preset course, the data depend epbt course. >> there see

we had steve schwartzman on the show a couple of weeks ago.king about residential real estate. blackstone has stopped buying. they have big a huge buyer. what does that say say about where the markets are. are you in agreement with him? >> i actually had a session yesterday with john gray for blackstone. i, from the beginning, had a different view of the opportunity in the single family market. i always said i think what blackstone and other members have done is a good trade. meaning what they bought it for and what they're selling it for will make a profit. >> right. >> what i have always challenged is whether that single family structure can be turned into an operating and efficient company. my real challenge is as time goes, on even today, if blackstone sold one house they would be unable to replace it. in terms of a value playing field. as we know, public companies don't do well on one-time events. they started by buying 5,000 homes. and i think you will watch them liquidate 5,000 homes. >> there's been an argument that firms have propped

don jay often talks about his successor at some point down the road to steven schwartzman.ime he's rung the bell, so many different things going on blackstone during the course of the bell in terms of offerings. it's probably a record. >> jonathan, not all managers are created equal. this guy is a smart guy and done a lot of right things. >> buying stuff as they seemingly did at the top and yet being able to create multiple returns on it. la quinta one of them. hilton they did dwight well on, not as well as la quinta. >> one of the most important things, the range. this is the beginning of the closing of the window of the ipos which is very positive for existing stocks. very positive. >> all right. >> good call too. >> again, the s&p managed to avoid four days down yesterday and the nasdaq recovers from those worst three days since 2011. there's the bell. look at the s&p at the top of your screen and la quinta, celebrating its ipo. we'll talk to the company's ceo in the next hour. over at the nasdaq, ikang health care celebrating its ipo. we'll speak to the ceo later in the