package delivery that the postal service does. it is up from $3.7 billion just five years earlier. is this a place where the post office is making money? it is hard to tell. you'd think it would be easy to figure out. revenue money cost equals whether or not you have a profit. the postal service is a massive enterprise. figuring out how to attribute a bridge -- a particular cost to whether it is paper mail versus complicatedmore than you would expect. especially in a time of rapid growth. the number of parcels they have -- they are carrying has quintupled in years. host: what is the biggest expense for the postal service? in 2017,did they make 60 $9.6 billion it is expensive. of.3 billion with a net loss 2.7 billion. what do you attribute that lost to? guest: certainly it is revenue stagnant. it is hard for any business to --y profitable when you are when your main line of business has not grown. mail volume has actually fallen by close to 30% in the past decade. parcels are the sole exception there. the postal service has kind of

the postal service is a massive enterprise. figuring out how you attribute a particular cost is way more complicated than you might expect, especially in a time of rapid growth. the number of parcels they're carrying has quintupled in ten years. >> i want to talk about the biggest expense for the post service. show viewers how much the post service made in fiscal year 2017. $69.6 billion. its expenses, though, $72.3 billion with a net loss of $2.7 billion. what do you attribute that loss to? >> well, certainly it's revenue stagnant. it's hard for any business to stay profitable when your main line of business has not grown. mail volume has actually fallen by close to 30% in the past decade. parcels are the sole exception there. which means the postal service has kind of been in a relentless financial crunch. >> with the amazon criticism from the president, five or six tweets in the past two weeks about this, has the president ever gotten directly involved in the deals that get negotiated between the big shippers and the post ser

on the postal side, the foreign postal carrier collects that data and transmits to it the u.s. postal service who transmits it to us. >> so that's what we have to try to streamline and improve upon is what you're indicating. okay. what do you do with the data when you get it? are you deploying analytics? >> yes. >> do you have cutting edge technology? >> yes. we have our advanced targeting system. we have our national targeting center out in northern virginia. we've got everything you talked about down to a counter network dwhags will identify the networks behind different shipments and things of that nature. so we have a very robust targeting system that we'll use not only our past enforcement results but inputs from the intelligence community. all sorts of different intelligence items and further streamline those targeting capabilities so that when we have those 1.7 million parcels coming in a day, we can identify those that need to be held because they have a higher risk for whatever trigger our targeting systems said there is a concern here. >> that's good to hear. is the an

so, you know, the u.s. postals definitely the victim of a lot of broader tech know longcle trends e-commerce has been helping them to morgan's point this is a very complex organization and the retirement and the pensions and the workers and the insurance, it's a big complex machine and it's kind of classic trump to just say, they made a bad deal i know deals, they made a bad deal, let's renegotiate the deal there's a lot of complexity there. >> we tend to hear that a lot on all sorts of issues. tesla's ceo elon musk speaking out as federal investigators are looking into a deadly crash last month involving the company's autopilot system in an interview with cbs musk addressed the safety concerns. >> it's important to emphasize we'll never be perfect. >> autopilot will never be perfect? >> no. nothing in the real world is perfect. but i do think that long term, it can reduce accidents by a factor of ten so there are ten fewer fatalities and tragedies and serious injuries and that's a really huge difference >> tesla'

toluse: they will be investigating issues related to the postal service. ng at a number of issues that have already been discussed and studies. -- and stuided. -- and studied. putting the treasury department at the top of the task force signals that president trump is a serious, but it raises the question about whether or not this is a redundant effort, using the taxpayer funds within the treasury department to look at things the taxpayer has already paid for, with various other bodies, government bodies that are already looked at. and recommendations have been made to congress. shery: most changes would have to do with legislation anyway. is this more of a messaging tool? toluse: that is one way you can look at it. the president said he wants to look at the administrative changes he can do on his own, as well as legislative changes. the president has had trouble getting legislation through congress on very mundane issues. changes thisative task force may come up with to give the president power to make changes about the postal service. most of the changes

they pay the u.s. postal service for the work. >> exactly. but look at the problems that the postal service had even before amazon became their biggest customer, this is where i believe that the focus should be. and that is to have congress let the postal service operate like a normal business. they can't do that right now because of constraints imposed by congress. that's the biggest problem and i believe that that's where the focus ought to be. >> shepard: mr. cain, let me ask you about the other issue. trade. trade agreements with china and china coming out today and saying, okay, now we're going to level tariffs on $3 billion of american goods. that has so many worked up that you're seeing markets down nearly 500 points today. are these fears that you're seeing reflected on wall street overblown or do they have merit in your view? >> i think they're overblown. here's why. any time there's that change like when the president imposed tariffs, we saw a lot of negative volatility in the market. now china has reacted. we saw more negative volt

on amazon'sgosar relationship with the u.s. postal service. on the topo governor policy issues in his state as part of c-span 50 capitals to her. as always, we take your calls, and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. "washington journal" is next. ♪ host: good morning. it is monday, april 9, 2018. congress returns to capitol hill after a two-week absence, the senate reconvenes at 3:00 p.m. the house will hold a pro forma session today and will meet tomorrow afternoon to legislative business. we will be with you for the next three hours on the "washington journal." we begin discussing the role the new national security advisor will play in the trump administration, on this, his first day on the job. let's hear your thoughts on the former u.s. ambassador and fox news commentator by giving us your call. .epublicans, (202) 748-8001 democrats, (202) 748-8000. .ndependents, (202) 748-8002 you can also reach us on facebook and twitter. a very good monday morning to you. john bolton's first day on the job coming amid a growing crisis

the u.s. postal service, was very early to understand the magnitude of the problem in the fact that the u.s. postal service was a critical vulnerability that we had and that it was being used as a vector for the drugs to get into the united states. we began-- we ondp began working with other law enforcement to do a couple of things. the first thing is to get advance electronic data from the shipping company, or from the originating country, so that they know the shipments coming into the united states before they get here and that's usually 72 hours out and that's for tracked and untracked packages. the volumes that we are talking about are enormous. up to about 144,000 packages every single day into one national service center. so, when you get advanced electronic data, they can share that with customs and border protection so that they can pull aside and give separate attention to those companies most related to the illicit shipment of goods. so that's the first thing. the second thing is the nonin

of volume for the postal service, which has been losing it from other places. this is about the president not liking news coverage that holds him accountable for his behavior and policies. >> that's a general consensus from a lot of people. let's look at amazon. talk about a huge following. as of september last year, 90 million amazon prime members in the u.s. there in terms s of t s s subscription service. are there markers to this? >> absolutely. we saw the comments about amazon last week and that has a huge impact on the company and the fact you have a president picking and choosing different companies and targeting amazon in this case raises a wide variety of concerns and back to john's point, which i think is absolutely right, if the president were serious about the tax policy components or postal components, he could push for legislation there is legislation in congress right now dealing with online sales tax and so he could do that but i think to john's point, that's not his ultimate goal here and it is having a variety of different implicatio implicatio

the postal service and amazon are not putting these out. but how much of this is the thministration just trying to get a better deal on the next negotiation here with the postal service? rv reporter: that could be one of the president's motivations, ivff. after all, typically, amazon would have a distinct upper hand in these negotiations. it does have other options, after all, like private shippers, and is even reportedly testing out its own delivery service, which could some day n come a competitor to the postal service. >> glor: interesting to follow. nancy cordes, thank you very much. rde first person was sentenced today in the special counsel's investigation of russian stddling in the u.s. election. dutch attorney alex van der zwaan got 30 days in prison and a $20,000 fine. he pleaded guilty to lying to yivestigators about his conversations with a former trump campaign official. van der zwaan is the son-in-law of one of russia's richest men. in oklahoma, public school teachers say it's a matter of math. more money is needed for toucation

the postal service doesn't use taxpayer money for their operation. >> anderson, you know this as well as i do and brian does for that matter, too. this president is actually remarkable in his ability to identify critical issues like massive technology monopolies that are destroying jobs, taking business, not in a negative way. amazon is beneficial to us. amazon is a new world for us. but the reality is the president is really good at identifying the right problem, massive tech monopolies, but always goes to the wrong solution. the post office? really? the foundation of our country is communication. the post office is in our constitution. it's a pity to watch an issue so important as global networks for things like distribution and product that amazon represents, literally a modern-day railroad, that really probably should be confronted for antitrust in a way that is rational and thoughtful. and instead of a rational and thoughtful discussion about the impact of a massive tech monopoly, we end up with a personal vendetta and a silly conversation about the post office. it's unfortunate

and fedex, the postal service is always lower. is -- and when i go and i want to ship something, i pay one price if i send it by u.p.s., if i send it by the u.s. postal service, i pay a lower price. everybody, it seems to me, is getting some kind of subsidy here, because the postal regulatory commission has set the rates for whatever reason, lower than they ought to be. that's not amazon's fault. is it? is may turn out to be amazon's problem, because they're going to come along under the pressure of the president and say, okay, we have to raise the prices here so that we're not, quote, losing money on every package we deliver for amazon my final point is, it's not just amazon that's paying these rates. now, amazon may have a special bulk deal where their prices are even lower than, say, best buy's prices or if i buy something from costco that is shipped to me, but the truth is, have i come close to analyzing it right? >> yeah, i think you have nailed it there in general, amazon should pay a lower cost than everyone else because ju

the postal service wanted to celebrate the occasion. i'm very happy that we're launching this project here today which should on the dotted lead be successful. however the drone didn't get far. it crashed after just a few seconds in the air. nobody was injured. but the dream won't be flying again any time soon. that's it you're up to date with the latest from the wild old business on how the homefront thanks for your company and . going to the to going to. the to the to the to the to the to the to the to the to. the to. the to the to the to. those done the germany is a strong country. that we have achieved so much we can do this and if something hinders on some we must overcome it. going where it's uncomfortable global news that matters w made for mines. euro. zone what unites. what defines. the body of. polish. what binds the continent to a answers and stories a plenty. small why don't people know a focus on your. on t.w. . birth place home two moons of species. a home worth saving. those are big changes and most start with small steps

but the postal service wanted to celebrate the occasion. i'm very happy that we're launching this project here today which showed on the dotted lead be successful. however the drone didn't get far. it crashed after just a few seconds in the air. nobody was injured. but the dream won't be flying again any time soon. that's it you're up to date with the latest from the walled old business on helena humphrey thanks evah your company and . going to try to. control the. i'm going to. try to cut. cut cut. cut. cut cut cut cut. cut cut cut cut cut. cut. when i was young means about changing the world. but i was a woman in egypt some things turned out differently forced marriage genital mutilation humiliation. so i know what else a doll we read about. the written word to stand up for women's rights. now while inside our the free voice of egypt starting. on t w yeah i'll do nashville and i think one day this war will be considered a cruel and unjust war where he will solution and certainly all citizens will ukraine every man woman and child to she n

the agreement between the postal service and amazon that's not public. elling us what the details are of that. but, clearly, the usps is not suffering in its delivery service. >> shepard: amazon could always just use u.p.s. if it wanted. >> to other options amazon is building its own delivery service right now. but it doesn't look like this is a huge problem for the united states postal service. keep in mind, this is -- postal service is separate, right? right?shep no tax dollars go to the postal service. >> right on. >> shepard: amazon lost a lot of value because of the president's recent tweets. >> some 60 billion over the last five days. >> shepard: $60 billion. >> here is what bezos lost this is my back to the envelope calculation. bezos owns some 82 million shares. if that's true he lost about $17 million. >> shepard: 17 million? >> um-huh. >> shepard: he has a lot of millions. >> he does, indeed. >> shepard: okay, ger, thank you. i want to turn to financial analyst, chief researchers for 8 squared research. the post office is better with amazon or w

this is the executive body that oversees all major decisions for the postal service. confirmed by the senate later this month, they may take their cues directly from the white house. >> the key thing is that there would be three people appointed by trump in a position of authority and power to say to the sales department hey, we want you to take a more strategic look at this amazon contract. we want to reevaluate the strength of the postal service's negotiating position heading into october. and we want to get a good deal. >> president trump has been sounding off on the u.s. postal service's decline and making it clear he places the blame squarely with amazon. accusing the tech giant of essentially mooching off taxpayer dollars. >> you take a look at the post office, and the post office is losing billions of dollars and the taxpayers are paying for that money because it delivers packages for amazon at a very below cost. >> so with new politically appointed leadership in place at the postal service potentially just a few weeks from now, president trump may very well get

they pulled out the amazon aunld the packages it ships they help the postal service. the real challenge the decline in junk mail, you don't get as many and regular mail frankly all the internet and e-mail, getting rid of all of that. >> i'll send a letter, peter, you know. >> reporter: i'll see you shortly. >> i will see you. you can go home and take a nap after being up all night with all of that news. i want to bring in the former spokesman for john boehner back with me. michael, how do you see this? is the president worried about the post office or is this one shot across the bow? >> there's no question that the post office's service model is not sustainable as a business in the 20th century. but amazon is not part of that problem. the postal service has been clear they make money opts business for amazon. had two things for now. this is a president who utterly impervious to new facts, he thinks amazon is costing them money, you can not change his mind. this is a president who's willing to use the tools of the office, the tools of the government to go after those he

plus, a new indication the president is about to wage war on amazon as he fights for the postal service. >>> a shocking crash. two planes collide at this airport in the midwest killing two firefighters. the investigation into what happened just as one plane was taking off. >>> plus, college basketball crowns its new champion as fans light fires in the streets in celebration. >>> and should you work out now or later? the best time of day to hit the gym. >>> and the new flavor of lipstick that really is an acquired taste. >>> a good tuesday morning, everyone. we begin with the debate over legal immigration and more late night tweets from president trump. >> he says u.s. laws are weak and our country is being stolen. his claims are in response to a caravan of more than 1,000 migrants from central america heading who are now heading towards the united states boa border. overnight we learned that mexico has turned about 400 of those migrants around. but the president is demanding more action. >> he's also raising new questions about the future of undocumented immigrants that arrived in the u

those are the things that are really impacting the financial health of the u.s. postal service, not amazon. but the president has made it his target. the president primed amazon for an attack as the candidate. >> if i become president, they have problems. >> am-on is gazon is getting aw murder. >> reporter: tweeting a series of accusations claiming the postal service loses billions of dollars, delivering amazon packages. the president demanded this post office scam must stop. amazon must pay real cost but experts say amazon has a confidential contract for package delivery that was approved by postal service regulators, bringing new business to a struggling enterprise. >> mail volume has gone down more than 25% over the last decade and amazon and other companies are bringing parcels into a system that's desperately in need of revenue. >> under cutting another claim made by the president, amazon collects sales tax in all 45 states that require it but third party sellers on the site act inde independently. the president's real ire is aimed at jeff bazos that owns "the wash

the postal service is a long story of a long slow fall down the stairs for the postal service and howt's run and so i don't know. we'll see if they raise rates it will impact amazon i suspect they'll do something about it delivery is critically important and critically important part of their business and i can't imagine jeff bezos hasn't thought this one through very carefully going forward i just didn't -- i assume he didn't expect the president of the united states to write a series of often inaccurate tweets about him and he'll deal with it. he'll deal with the situation. in the short term the stock will get hit. but again, i've seen -- they've done it a bunch -- he's done it a bunch of other times to other companies and they all seem to recover. and we'll see what happens on this deal that they strike with the post office. i mean the pofrs hst office has vulnerability too. >> to david's point, you mentioned the president targeted other companies. those companies eventually got drawn in to a political conversation or left a committee. i'm thinking of ken frasier, for instance but

the president taking on amazon this morning and the postal service to some degree saying i am right about amazon costing the united states post office massive amounts of money for being their delivery boy. amazon should pay these costs and not have them born by the american taxpayers. the president constant attacks against amazon yesterday led to a sell-off in the tech sector in the stock market leaving the market down some 500 points yesterday. things appear to be heading back in positive direction today. >> you cover so much ground. we'll cover those issues later in the show. fascinating to see how openly the president talks about immigration and trade all in one tweet and many tweets, really. >> speaking of covering a lot of ground. 11 acres, feels like the open range of texas when it comes to the number of issues we're covering. >> jon: the trump administration saying it's open to a meeting between president trump and vladimir putin. this comes amid escalating tensions between the two countries after 60 russian diplomats were expelled from the u.s. after a nerve agent attack of a russ

president trump tasking secretary mnuchin with investigating the postal service's finances. ot the only threat that amazon is facing. you know, the pentagon is looking to award a multibillion dollar contract. amazon is right now in the lead. this would allow military information to go into the cloud. president trump's long-running battle against the company, but there are some new concerns whether or not amazon alone can meet the defense department's highly sensitive needs. and, by the way, is there any other real competitor, because some in silicon valley saying they've been shut out of this. joining me now to discuss, emily and katie frates. emily, let me start with you on this. you know, it's interesting because a lot of stocks got slammed on this post office news. some more than amazon. stamps.com got rocked and a few other names. so this certainly roiled the market a little bit. but what do you think will come out of it? >> yeah, and we don't know the implications of this. we don't know much about what this is going to uncover because a lot of the agreements between amaz

president trump renewed his attack on its relationship with the united states postal striking the dow down almost three percent child claims u.s.p.s. is losing money on delivering amazon and taxpayers a fina in the lawsuits analysts point out that the online retailing giant payments actually supports the postal service is all the money using businesses and its massive pension obligations they say imus is helping the u.s.p.s. float but estimates say amazon pays the u.s.p.s. roughly half of what rival pulsatile services would be charging. eight affronts what could be three months of rolling rail strikes on the way in the cessna series of walkouts affecting sectors from energy to garbage collection is in opposition to french president to money when michael's labor market reform agenda. rail workers are especially angry with the government plans to do way with train drivers rights to retire at fifty two the administration also wants to make cuts to their current holiday entitlement to fifty days per year those kind of privileges cost a lot of money and state owned railway s.n.c.f. has acc

he's accusing the online retailer of scamming the postal service and hurting american workers. kelly o'donnell has the story. kelly? >> reporter: good morning, dara. the president has many different types of twitter adversaries. but this weekend he renewed his fight with a massive e-commerce business that is popular with consumers who are also voters. the president's reasons may be personal. during his motorcade right to the golf course, president trump delivered his own package of tweets, blasting amazon with flawed accusations. this post office scam must stop. amazon must pay real costs. the president scorned for the online giant runs deep, conflating anger at amazon with "the washington post," both owned by jeff bezos but operating separately. along simmering frustration. >> "the washington post," which i call a lobbying tool for amazon, okay, that's a lobbying tool for amazon. >> reporter: but experts say the president's claim that the post office will lose $1.50 on average for each package it delivers for amazon cannot be backed up. postal service regulators approved contra

the postal service may feel pressure though they do not have a direct link to the president. they are an independent agency, to take a look at the deal amazon has. >> amazon rebounding and the session up .6% after it took pressure. ,> there is at least one member mr. pruitt. a lot of reporting about his conduct. apparently, he said hang in there. i do not know exactly what it means. in the presidency, things change. their report on the conduct of his financial route -- affairs is still pending. that he wouldrts make a recommendation. let's wait and see. >> you did help us. you had dealt's -- doubts but you helped us. great to have you. coming up, president trump is already mimicking his predecessor in one important way to we will go to washington for the story next. this is bloomberg. ♪ david: we turn now to mark crumpton. mark: special counsel robert mueller is defending and all -- the indictment of former campaign chairman paul manafort by releasing a secret memo, from deputy attorney general rod rosenstein, which gave mueller the already to investigate crimes related to ma

he claims the company is not paying the u.s. postalervice affair rate for carrying o the liveries on behalf of the online retail giant. officent trump: the post is losing biions of dollars d the taxpayers are paying for that money because it delivers packages for amazon at a very below cost. that is not fair to the united states. it is not fair to taxpayers and amazon have the money pay the fare rate at the post office which would be much more than they are paying right now. for more on whathis means for amazon, i spoke with a senior reporter for cnet, a technology website. the president said the u.s. postal service is delivering packages for amazon at such low rate that it is a subsidy. is he right? you end upds on who talking to. i wish i could give you a straight answer to rea truify whether president was actually being 100% truthful about this. how doccount for how much it costs to deliver one package to one doorstep? laura: we saw the share price from yesterday and it rallied of it today. but th cash, haven't they?f >> amazon has

as far as applications for the postal service, it's possible they could pay a higher rate. say deal is that amazon could probably not get the same economics with fedex, ups, or any of the regional players. but the good news for amazon is they're increasing their first party the just six assets. they have air freight, -- their first party logistics assets. they have air freight. they have a physical presence that they can also leverage to work on their logistics efforts. i will give a quick example. when i go to my local whole foods, i'm greeted with an amazon locker. it's another place i can pick up products i order on amazon or return them. while there is potential that disruption to amazon from losing the postal service, perhaps in the most dramatic scenario, i think the impact would not be as significant as some fear. emily: what about the bigger picture regulatory issues? we were speaking earlier about a huge pentagon cloud computing contract that amazon competitors believe seems destined to win. safra catz complained about this to the president. there was no evidence t

profitable for the postal service.he post office's losses are mostly due to pension and health care costs, not its deal to deliver packages for amazon. >>> house speaker paul ryan has remained silent on his re-election plans. his challenges announced he raised $2.1 million last quarter alone. that brings his total to 4.75 million dollars so far. yet even with the spike in fund-raising, ryan will still be hard to beat. the house speaker currently has a war chest of about $10 million. however, with just under 60 days to the filing deadline, he has not said publicly whether he will seek another term. ryan said he and his wife wait until the spring of every election year to determine whether or not he will run. >>> according to a fox news poll, 46% of democrats say they are more enthusiastic about voting this year. >> gabby, good to talk to you this morning. thanks for joining us so early. as we just talked about earlier, it seems as if russia is pushing the white house for a meeting with president trump. i guess the big q

in theory he could replace members of the postal board. sure whether they can be fired or not. , they have contracts generally have to be honored. you can't just abrogate them without paying a penalty. in the future it possible the postal service would want to raise the cost but there has been no evidence that the president knows anything about what he's talking about in terms of amazon and the contracts they have according to the postal service. amazon pays the same rate as everybody else and helps the package delivery business. amazon and others helps keep the postal service operating because it makes up a great percentage of their revenue. shery: president trump has fornated three individuals the vacancies in the postal service. that is still awaiting confirmation. we keep pennington h.r. mcmaster to wilbur ross -- panning h.r. mcmaster and wilbur ross. the latest we have heard about another member of staff is scott pruitt is being kept as epa chief and that the president actually supports him. that's right. my colleagues reported that t

the tweets never had an impact on amazon until the specific postal service one, which came at the samen about facebook. i think it was the same week mark zuckerberg was on capitol hill. the market was sensitive, and no one in the white house is going to push the postal service to do anything serious. the postal service by all accounts seems to make money with its contract with amazon. at the end of the day, having the most powerful person in the world attacking you is not a good thing. caroline: great analysis from "bloomberg technology". we will see you both a lot next week make the earning season. that does it for bloomberg technology. happy weekend. this is bloomberg. ♪ this wi-fi is fast. i know! i know! i know! i know! when did brian move back in? brian's back? he doesn't get my room. he's only going to be here for like a week. like a month, tops. oh boy. wi-fi fast enough for the whole family is simple, easy, awesome. in many cultures, young men would stay with their families until their 40's. announcer: the following program is a commercial presentation of total gym fitness. ♪

their own website's list of ten things to know about the post office, fact one is, i'm quoting, the postal service receives no tax dollars for operating expenses and relies on the sale of postage, products, and services to fund its operation. now, here's another fact that might be relevant. amazon's founder jeff bezos also owns "the washington post" which the president despises. his attacks on amazon have been blamed for sending the stock market into wild gyrations. hundreds of points at a time. on top of that, the president attacked our boss at cnn, misspelling his name, took yet another shot at hillary clinton, and then tweeted this in reaction to some new polling. thank you to rasmussen for the honest polling. just hit 50% which is higher than cheatin' obama at the same time in his administration. not sure what kind of cheatin' he was referring to, perhaps we shall have to wait another tweet to explain that. mr. trump also repeated his call today to send troops to the southern border. >> i have been speaking with general mattis, we will be doing things militarily. until we can have a wa

they say the u.s. postalervice is riddled with problems and has been in crisis mode since the 1990s with the rise of the internet. >> dana: indeed. all right, jillian, thank you. >> thanks, dana. >> reporter: famed augusta national golf course announced plans to host its first tournament for women. the course will host a 54-hole amateur tournament starting next year. as for the tournament that made the course famous, the masters, it teed off this morning. jack nicklaus and gary player -- that's his name. i didn't know that. started the event with a ceremonial tee shot. this year all marks the return of four time green jacket winner tiger woods. i did know him. playing in his first major tournament after a series of back injuries. so he's back. looking for a prom date. how chick fil-a is trying to help one of its employees get a date for the dance. also tomorrow i will be speaking with sheryl sandberg live from their headquarters. there's little rest for a single dad. and back pain made it hard to sleep and ge

the tweets never had an impact on amazon until the specific postal service one, which came at the samen about facebook. i think it was the same week mark zuckerberg was on capitol hill. nsitive, andas set se no one in the white house is going to push the postal service to do anything serious. the postal service by all accounts seems to make money with its contract with amazon. at the end of the day, having the most powerful person in the world attacking you is not a good thing. caroline: great analysis from "bloomberg technology". we will see you both a lot next week make the earning season. that does it for bloomberg technology. happy weekend. this is bloomberg. ♪ welcome to the xfinity store. i can tell you about... streaming the most free tv shows and movies on the go. yeah, and... xfinity internet. it's so fast! and you can save by... by getting up to 5 mobile lines included. whoa, you're good. i'm just getting started. ♪ simple. easy. awesome. come see how you could save $400 or more a year with xfinity mobile. plus ask how to keep your current phone. visit your local xfinity stor

postal service was very early to understand the magnitude of the problem and the fact that the u.s. postal service was a critical vulnerability that we had and that it could be used as a vector for the drugs to get into the united states. we began working with him closely and worked across the interagency with other federal law and is meant to do a couple of things. the first thing is to get the advanced electronic data from the shipping company or from originating country so they know the shipments that are coming in to the united states before they get here and that is usually about 72 hours out. that's tracked and untracked packages. the vines we're talking about are enormous. up to about 144,000 packages every single day into one international service center so when you get advanced electronic data that they can share that with customs and border protection so that they can pull aside and give separate attention to those companies that are most related to the illicit shipment of goods so that is the first thing. the second thing is the nonintrusive detection capability that is th

he accuses the online retailer of bilking americans by abusing the u.s. postal service. ght, correspondent gillian turner tells us he could be getting close to a change in that arrangement. >> the post office is losing billions of dollars and the taxpayers are paying for that money because it delivers packages for amazon ads are very below cost. >> the much-maligned deal between usps and amazon has been in place for five years and it's set to expire in october. now tech insiders tell fox news that new leaders appointed by the president himself may soon take the reins at the struggling agency and determine the deal's fate. president trump's nominated three people to the usps board of governors. the executive body that oversees all its major decisions. they are calvin tucker, chairman of the philadelphia black republican council. robert duncan, chairman of the president's commission on white house fellowship. and david williams, former inspector general for usps. if these nominees are confirmed by the senate later this month, president trump's views on amazon will be front

there are some serious issues with the united states postal service. 's at the same rights and allocation of expenses to the package delivery part of its business since 2007. it's really way overdue for an adjustment. back in 2007 as we all know, we did not have such a dependence on mail order as we do today and amazon's business was a mere fraction of what it is today. and one of the problems the president is facing is that he is now made to four members of the postal regulatory commission but they are being held up in the senate along with a number of other nominees. if you got those people in place, 80, he'd be able to have adjustment of those rates and some sizing of those rates, so there is some subsidy going on whether -- one more point. we could look at the pension issue. the reason that the postal service wants a negative and a deficit is because it has to prepay its pension for 75 years worth of benefits. >> jason: you are 100% worth that much. i spent a lot of time on the postal issue, the decline in first class mail, the pension issues, a big

in favor of the postal service. the tech sector into the rest of america, this is about the future of brick-and-mortar and retail and what happens if a player like amazon is forced to bear out some of the consequences that the president would like to see happen? you can't put the cat back in the box and you can't move america away from the future of online retail. >> chris: we will discuss more of this, i'm sure. see you next sunday. up next, our "power player of the week," how the birth of two baby bald eagles attracted international attention for one of d.c.'s hidden gems. >> chris: pope francis celebrating easter mass this morning at the vatican. it's one of washington's hidden treasures just 2 miles from the u.s. capitol building. as we showed you in 2016, thanks to some stars, it has captured the world's attention. here's our power player of the week. >> i think people are fascinated by this. this is a real live action nature front of their eyes. >> chris: richard olson is talking about the birth of two baby ba

in the meantime, a task force to look into the postal service and what they're doing, after this. e to severe rheumatoid arthritis was intense. i wondered if she could do the stuff she does for us which is kinda, a lot. and if that pain could mean something worse. joint pain could mean joint damage. enbrel helps relieve joint pain, and helps stop further damage enbrel may lower your ability to fight infections. serious, sometimes fatal events including infections, tuberculosis, lymphoma other cancers, nervous system and blood disorders and allergic reactions have occurred. tell your doctor if you've been someplace where fungal infections are common. or if you're prone to infections, have cuts or sores, have had hepatitis b, have been treated for heart failure or if you have persistent fever, bruising, bleeding or paleness. don't start enbrel if you have an infection like the flu. since enbrel, my mom's back to being my mom. visit enbrel.com... and use the joint damage simulator to see how joint damage could progress. ask about enbrel. enbrel. fda approved for over 18 years. each da

let me ask you this, the postal service, i know you are not a fan of excessive government spending youll the waste that happened in our government an one good point to the post office being another example of this. grover, do we need isn't. >> there is nothing wrong with the post office. what is wrong is the monopoly it has on first class mailthey take the profits, they earn from the monopoly, we go to jail if we put a letter in somebody's mailbox without paying a stamp. they subsidize the packages. so there is a subsidy for amazon or anyone else who uses post office because you and i when we send mail or get junk mail, that subsidieses -- subsidizes their competition with fedex and ups. if we get rid of the monopoly they would be another business and no reason to be run by the government and get rid of the monopoly and subsidies. they should be corporatized. there is a lot of property to give to the workers and they would compete with everybody else. no more monopoly. >> i like the sound of that. grover, thank you so much. good to see you. >> >> we have breaking news to get to. inspec

as far as implications for the postal service, it's possible they could pai your rate. sweetheart deal is that amazon could not probably get the same economics with fedex, ups, or any of the regional players. good news for amazon's they are increasing their first party logistics asset. they have air freights, trucking. with whole foods locations and bookstores, they now have a physical presence that they can also leverage to work on their logistics. myexample, when i go to local whole foods, i'm greeted with an amazon mocker. it's another place i can pick up products i order on amazon or return them. while there is potential that the disruption to amazon from losing the postal service in the most are manic scenario, i think the impact would not be as significant as some may fear. emily: what about the bigger picture regulatory issues? we were talking about the cloud computing contract. catz complained about it to the president. he was receptive. there is no evidence the white house would interfere, but on a broader regulatory level, there's concern about how big amazon i

in the case of the postal service, i think amazon is getting a bit of a sweetheart deal. , the president is accurate. emily: one of the president's tweets -- officight about the post foring the delivery boy amazon. should pay these costs bourne byve them -- perhaps they should be making more money on that. how do you think this will actually affect amazon in the near-term? tom: first and foremost, all the tweets from the president basically convinced me that the second headquarters from amazon will be in his backyard. if you look at the 20 finalists for the second headquarters, three are near washington, d.c. or a suburb of it. basically the process of picking a second headquarters is about influence, and where else could amazon have more influence than being next door to washington, d.c.? why is that important? having influence with the policymakers, including the president is very important. as far as implications for the postal service, it's possible they could pay a higher rate. why i say sweetheart deal is that amazon could not probably get the same economics with fed

the president has tweeted and today spoke about how he believes amazon is taking advantage of the u.s. postal service amazon is going to have to pay much more money to the post office there's no doubt about that said mr trump here to talk about amazon tech stocks and a few other things thrown in for good measure is the admirable and accomplished our most founder of the stock's wish melissa thank you again for being with us as always so the president tweeted about amazon for what seems like a hundred times saying i've stated that my concerns with amazon long before the election unlike others they pay little or no taxes to state and local governments use our postal system as a delivery boy causing tremendous loss to the us and are putting many thousands of retailers out of business in reaction you know amazon stock took a dive from the march highs and while still up something like fifteen or sixteen percent this year they started to tank dipping under fourteen hundred today what's your thought about this melissa is this real is this needed war with amazon what's going on. well good to see your

it packs people's orders, sorts them by zip code and brings them to the correct postal service to do e last mile. it is beneficial for the post office as well because the postal service is grappling with jobbing -- dropping letter volume, parcel delivery like amazon is providing is picking up. it is providing them additional revenue. as long as you are under legal mandate to reach every address, the amazon relationship is beneficial. betty: spencer, thank you so much, our bloomberg tech reporter on the latest feud between president trump and amazon. i want to bring back matt, managing director of equity strategies, to talk more about the markets. joining us now from massachusetts. i want to bring up that chart again. it is on my terminal, which shows again, this key moment here, matt, where we have fallen below the 200 day moving average or close below that average. how significant is that to you? matt: well, it's interesting because it is important on a short-term basis. you see how with a chart it got down to the level several different times and bounced strongly off it each time. t