first left is, the secretary of the nancy secretary of agriculture, tom vilsack.estor katherine tai from the u.s. trade representative. director the cfc be, rohit chopra a forclosure, german of e industries exchange commission gary gensler and last, but certainly not least, chair of the surface transportation board, martin overman, thank you for being with us today. >> live at quÉbec. >> you be wonderful to just start at the outset and explain to us, how you think about competition policy in the context of your agency and your mission.ou maybe tom vilsack you can start us off. >> i thank you so greatly important, we have lost 544970 forms says secretary of agriculture raise concerns about the consolidation of farmland and what we've seen a look horse of the last 40 years is a consolidation of just about everything connected to agriculture and i would see is very hard fore small and midsize farming operations have a shot under this administration came along. we know believable of government, the opportunity that we have worked closely with the department of justice

secretary of agriculture tom vilsack, thank you for joining us. certainly a critical time in congress when it comes to farming. coming up, cutting full year ebidta. stick with us. this is bloomberg. ♪ this is our future, ma. godaddy airo. creates a logo, website, even social posts... in minutes! -how? -a.i. (impressed) ay i like it! who wants to come see the future?! get your business online in minutes with godaddy airo ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ discover our newest resort sandals saint vincent and the grenadines, now open. visit sandals.com or call 1—800—sandals. sonali: this is "bloomberg markets," and i'm sonali basak. time for stock of the hour. a cannabis operator cut its full-year guidance. jon erlichman has more on this from toronto. talk to us about tilray. what is going on in terms of its ability to make money? jon: the context with cannabis stocks across the industries they have come into this -- there has been a lot of excitement about possible changes that the federal level in the united states. a lot of the excitement got started when the vice presi

douglas holtz-eakin will join us and later tom vilsack will be with us to discuss inflation.on the farm to your table. we will talk about food prices. "squawk box" coming right back. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪ ♪ >>> welcome back to "squawk box." futures right now are down. we are looking at the dow, off about 76 points. the nasdaq down 71 points. the s&p 500 off 15 points. we've had a number of big financials, wells fargo, citi and black rock all reporting this morning. we will talk more about that in a mom. let's talk taxes because a new "wall street journal" op-ed out and our next guest says there's a good opportunity for reform this year. next, as many revisions in the 2017 tax cuts and jobs act are set to expire. joining us douglas holtz-eakin, former director at the congressional budget office. he wrote in the op-ed with former texas congressman kevin brady. what do you think the chances are -- let's start with just handicap where things stand. maybe it is almost impossible to because we don't know who is in control of what or where they will be when this all happens, but what do

tom vilsack, secretary of agriculture, joins bloomberg tv 12:30 new york time.loomberg. ♪ katie: it's time for our daily "wall street week" conversation. alternative investment are having their time in the spotlight as investors search for yield and liquidity. how should investors be balancing the risk? christian olson is head of the alternative markets group at goldman sachs, along with david westin. we are looking forward to this. david: they are in the spotlight can it is not as if we don't know the goods. there is a lot of talk about alternatives and money flowing in alternatives. why now should we talk about putting more money into alternatives, and who should talk about it? >> couple different questions there. i spent the last 25-plus years at the intersection of wealth management and alternative investments, and it has never been more interesting. if you step back and look at what has happened to the private investment world, you are gone from a decade ago having $4 trillion in private investments to know $15 trillion. incredible growth. what is fuel that

policy and we are tremendously fortunate to have an all-star cast with us today but secretary vilsack ambassador tom: chairman over men and kanter to share how agencies across the federal government are taking aggressive steps to bolster competition it's been hobbled by consolidation concentration and other roadblocks resulting in higher prices lower wages declining entrepreneurship growing inequality and a less vibrant democracy. even as we drop outside the ftc to discuss the whole of government approach to competition i encourage everyone not to sleep on important poll of the agency approach that's happening within the ftc. when i first arrived at the agency six years ago i was surprised by how they ftc silence them from one another. this never made sense to me because fundamentally believe consumer protection law is an important competition guard rail. consumer protection law at its best ensures that honest competing fairly to provide the best products, services and innovation to the market. without gaining a competitive edge through deception or in fairness. to that end our consumer protection a