The Fed is about to enter its traditional pre-FOMC blackout period, so speakers were plentiful this week. We speak with Conor Sen about whether traders are pricing in the right move in September. Clara Ferreira Marques joins to analyze Vladimir Putin's propaganda agenda via RT. And Shuli Ren considers how China could learn lessons on growth from its Communist neighbor Vietnam.
Welcome to Bloomberg Opinion. I'm Vonnie Quinn this week, what's really interesting is this constant questioning, this idea that there is always a consor narrative, so we have to constantly bus everything to the point that everything is unknowable. Tara for Era Marquez on Putin's propaganda war. Later, we'll speak with Julie Ran on lessons China could learn from a neighbor. First to the market though. Lots of FED speakers this week before the FED hits it's blackout period, all vowing the FED will conquer inflation. Here is Jerry J. Powell at the Cato Institute Thursday. The longer inflation remains well above target, the greater the concern that the public will start to naturally incorporate higher inflation into its economic decision making, and our job is to make sure that doesn't happen. We're with Bloomberg Opinions. Connor Sen Connor. Some FED speaker is going so far is to give specific reasons why we'll continue to see inflation moderate Lele Brainer, for example, talking about lower retail margins and cooling housing. How much is the inflation threat receding. I think it's significant we're going to see in the August inflation the PO report next week. But we've seen gas prices come off a lot. Obviously, there's signs of supply chains using all of the place. Auto production is picking up, which would help with auto pricing. That there seems to be some data suggesting that auto prices are coming down now as well. And so then it really becomes a question of your view of how inflation will stick for core services and labor. But this is subjective view. But I just think that that's going to come down somewhat as well as the economy kind of normalizes from its pandemic state. Right. But we did see wage growth often just a little bit, right, I mean, it's not like the labor market is intensely strong, right, And at the sector level, we're seeing signs that in the industries where labor growth was the most acute last year, things like leisure and hospitality and transportation and warehousing, things like e commerce and Amazon, that in those industries that's coming off more than it is for the labor market of the whole, suggesting to me that that's going to sort of spread throughout the rest of the labor market. Has hiring catches up to demand. Yeah, so there are question marks surrounding the labor market. In one sense, it's help the economy. In another sense, a less strong labor market is what we're looking for. So traders are still looking for a seventy five basis point hike in September. But is a less aggressive hike warranted given all the bite spots that you know, you and I have been pointing out and the moderating inflation in the data. It's a complicated question because I think that the Fed's main goal right now, and we sort of stave us with sed share pal speech at Jackson Hole, is that they don't want to market the price a pivot in monetary policy and a surge back in stock markets and the housing market and so on. They think that keeping markets and the housing market kind of where they are, I would say at least a few more months is critical for them as they assess how much progress we've made on inflation. And they can't really tell us that they're anticipating inflation to come down in the near term, because again then we would price that they have a tricky path to walk right now as they bounce their goals. Yeah, and obviously we're seeing improvement in curves and so on as well, the copper curve for one example, but we do still have the two sns inverted, not the price thirties. Is the yield curve signaling procession right now? I would say it's signaling that near term inflation is going to be higher than longer term inflation. And whether you think that means recession or that they'll sort of moderate their stands down the road as there's signs that inflation has moderated. That gets to a subjective question. I'm so optimistic, but if you're looking for a recession, I'd say the Yelk curve maybe there's the most smoking gun you can see in markets right now. I saw I mentioned today a City note actually the possibility of what they're calling transitory stag inflation. So City talking about the potential to see elevated inflation and slower growth for just a couple of quarters, but that the result would be an enquoting now intensified stress and financial markets and increased pressures on central banks. So obviously City does have some concerns. Still, would that be a scenario that you think is a possibility that's arguabably got in the first half of the year where real GDP growth was negative and inflation accelerated, and so you know whether that continues or not. I actually think we've been making progress there over the past few months because we're seeing again that headline inflation is coming down, the labor market remains strong, so for workers, real incomes or seemed to be going again, which was not the case in the first half of the year. And there's also hopes that say, in the labor market, whereas workers get up to speed, we've all the new higher in the workplace, that they'll become more productive and that will help with this sort of stagg inflationary head when you've been dealing with as well. So I guess you're very optimistic in some ways. But how much can we look at the US market as a solo concern. Are you concerned at all about China and Europe slowing as it relates to feedback loops for example? Well, I certainly a much more pessimistic on the foreign situations before China can't seem to exit this code zerior situation. The ear problem is pretty well understood and discussed in terms of they're dealing with inflation, energy criss fallowing currencies, and it's very hard to be optimistic about Europe over the next six months. So I think the question is what are the feedback loops into the US and for financial markets, I think they're pretty high where we're seeing it in arguably that as interest rates rise in Europe as a deild conflation, that's pushing our yield higher. But the real economy pass through is much more limited my opinion, and we're not really seeing that yet data. Yeah, and so you might skirt any problems, is what you're saying. I think right now the adjustment is really happening more for Wall Street than Main Street, and that's something that we're not used to because for so long that was not the case. And we see this in the jobs of or we had another thre hid thousand jobs, and we see all these problems in areas of concerning financial markets. We just haven't seen the same thing happen in the real economy. So Connor, let me ask you, then, plenty of calls for the SMB to drop as much as scent I've seen from here, the founder of Interactive Brokers among them, but also Goldman Sacks Michael Bury Bank America clients and net sellaries at the moment, are you looking for the SMB to drop? Not like that right now. My view is that earnings estimates have been pretty stable for the past two months. We saw a little bit of weakness in July, which is mostly due to the currency impact on big tech companies. You know, Microsoft's earning less money from Europe due to the rise in the dollar previously. But outside of that, earning ustiments are pretty stable and they're not really following. And so if earnings don't fall at least meaningfully, then to me, you're not going to see that kind of weakness in the stock market. You might see some weakness as we've seen with rising interest rates making equities relatively less attractive, but that's not attend to fifteen percent sell off. That's just sort of stops moving in line with the bond market. Yeah, So, where is the potential for holes in your argument? Because when you lay it out, it seems plausible, very likely. Even there's certainly a lot of scenarios where this to go wrong. First, energy prices could flare back up and bring back the concerns of inflation that we had in May and June, we might we might see that productivity growth of labor market could continue to remain weak, which might mean more labor markets flowing that I'm anticipating the set could just mis read the economy and sort of overtighten into a slowdown and sort of cause reception before they have time to adjust. I think the path through is pretty limited. But if Europe and trying to get worse, then there could be some paths through there, so you could point to things where this could happen. But it's just right now, it's hard to see that with the state of the labor market, the state of Happle balance sheets, sort of where corporate America is my view of where inflation is going over the next two or three quarters. To me, we're just gonna do okay and model through even though we're being a lot in certainty day to day, week a week. Conners and there don't forget listeners. Get in touch via Twitter at Vanna Quinn or email v Quinn at Bloomberg dot net. Opinions and comments always welcome. Russia's RT Broadcast Operation bills itself as an English language news channel which brings the Russian of view on Global News. It's been banned in the United States and Europe, but a boomer opinions. Clara Ferreira Marquez points out it's winning friends in the developing world and as functioning as an important instrument in Vladimir Putin's propaganda campaign. Tara Ferra Marquez joins us, Now, so, Clara, what is RT? Who founded it? Who runs it? So? RT is Russia's twenty four our primarily the English but not only in English news network. It was founders in two thousand five, really the creature of two men, Mikail lives In, who was medium minister but at that time already presidential advisor in Alex Sigma, the former diplomat who'd run the press service, and they really understood that Russia needed a better instrument to communicate it, choosing to try and bring people around to the country's views. They felt really that the international traditional media was not doing a good enough job. And also the context is at the time for two thousand five is also when a lot of other non English sort of news channels were coming out. So this is our Jazeera in English France twenty four, So it wasn't alone at that point in time. And then it really has als. And that's what interested us when we were looking into it, is how it has changed over time, right, because I remember that year. I remember when it started. I had colleagues interested, just as they were interested in Al Jazeera. There was maybe a little bit of skepticism that there would be some pressure from the top two tow aligne or what have you, But in the main it seems like people were actually okay with working in many of these broadcast outlets. Did something change in the mission of RT over time? What has it become? So? I mean, I think to be clear, from the beginning, it was an instrument funded by the Russian government and intended for a particular purpose. It just was perhaps doing it in a slightly different way to At the beginning it was more about presenting news from Russia and the foremost of the Union that you know, wasn't really covered elsewhere. It was a little bit more straightforward. As it went on, things changed and the turning point there were few I mean, the two thousand and eight Georgian War was really a very significant one. At that point, the realization in becomment that perhaps this wasn't working as a way of getting their point across because and the Georgian War happened, if you remember, that was really about Russia having said they did not want Georgia and later and later going ahead allowing Georgia to begin talk, and then it accelerated from then on. I mean really, then you had the n team if you remember in twenty fourteen, that's a really good example of how the Channel works in terms of counter narratives and conspiracy theories. And then twenty seventeen and think of the scriptile poisoning in the UK and then obviously now that with the war in Ukraine. But what really then changed is the way that it moved from being primarily worried about Western markets who are much broader, do that focuses on the emerging world. Well, so it's not officially an arm of the government or anything like that. Is there any kind of an effort to suggest that it's still a free and fair organization or does it always just spit out what the government press office will tell it? So no, I mean our tea will say, and they told us they themselves operationally and editorially independent. They are however funded by the Russian g LINT. In their perspect the constellation of media companies that are Strip related, not all of them. Ownership structure is a little messy, but it all comes under sort of Russian government funded organizations that are certainly intended to get the Russian view across and they are also I think very interesting characters that pressly runs it women called who took over our tea very early. She's only twenty five when she took it on, and has with the war in Ukraine, become one of the strongest, most hawkish voices on Russian domestic television. So Art also has the sort of inn words function. It's so fascinating because obviously you always want a free and fair press. It is, after all, the fourth estate. But even in the freest of countries and societies, you have organizations with a bias or that are restricted in some way by their ownership or run by very hands on owners. Maybe elucidate for us the difference between something like a Fox News or an MSNBC or Rupert Murdock's Empire in Britain and Art. I mean, let's be clear that just by the virtue of what we choose to focus our energy, it's done in a way is editorializing, is making decisions. But the fact is that most mainstream media make a very significant effort to balance about reporting, unless it's not done at I T and in fact it's not done at Fox News either or indeed at the name group at Murdoch outlets in the UK. But I think what's really interesting is this what's about sism, which is this constant questioning, this idea that there is always a counter narrative, that we have to constantly bouse everything to the point that everything is unknowable. And that's a really powerful propaganda tool because if you think back to the Soviet propaganda or in the US propaganda during the Cold War, it was really about getting everyone to believe a particular narratives in the Soviet case, to try and get everyone to believe one thing. What's really powerful about tox news, about talk TV, about our t in particular, really who pioneered this? If you don't have to believe what we think, you just have to believe in nothing. So if you'd undertake an analysis of the rhetoric and the rhetorical devices, you would actually see similar types of devices being used. So beyond that rhetorical device, are there more that you've noticed Kara. Yeah, there's a few. There's one that's very effective. It's the mechanisms us been advertising to it. It's conspiratorial idea. It's this idea that I as the host, I as Pucker Casts, and I as one of the hosts on ARTI I speak to you directly and they say, you know, you're clever enough, you don't believe the official narratives. This conspiratorial connection works very well. Also the use of social media to both reinforce their narratives them to spreads them. That is done very very well. The use of changing audiences. So if you look at trust and mainstain media, the look at the way people can staine you, especially in the emerging world, much more on social media, which means that it's much easier to consume partisan news because if you're consuming news on social media's probably coming from people within your circle of people. People need the same as you. So it's not the same way as what it was like in the seventies of races, for everyone watches the same news religions, so it's encourages parts of the politics well now. So these types of organizations have always existed, but the viewer is supposed to use discretion in their viewing habits. Right. It's not that these organizations shouldn't be allowed to exist, although I'm sure some people would suggest that they shouldn't be allowed to exist. How are the viewers drawn in? And do we have viewership numbers for something like arety So No, not really, I mean we don't have very reliable ones. We have them necessarily patch rickly. It depends country by country. Our T tends to focus on people who are able to view the channel, which is obviously quite different from people who view the channel. I think the really important thing to understand about urt about Fox News better these channels, that people tend to view what they believe rather than believe what they see. You can see the difference. It's not that people watch our T and are instantly converted. It's the same way that you and I can watch Fox News and not automatically become you know, ultra Trump supporters. So that is true, But then when you're dealing with the changing news environment which people are consuming much more partisan news, it becomes quite a different proposition. And I think it's important to understmber that, Yes, the viewership is definitely small in Europe, but subtractors as an instrument. Once it gets into societies that are more skeptical a priori of the traditional media of the US of Western intentions, you're feeding an audience that is easier to bring along and also use of societies where media is typically still funded. It's not doing its own reporting. So, for example, when I look at sprytnic and artie content that is reproduced in Southeast Asia, it sucking reproduced without any such criticism because these organizations do not have their people on the grounds in Ukraine, Sarah, It's difficult to view are t through a non Western lens because obviously we have our biases and our perceptions and so on. But how is the art content perceived in other parts of the world. Do people accept it? Um Certainly people are a lot more sympathetic to something like actually because it isn't seen as some crazy Russian outlets. It's seen as the way of obtaining me but is resably okay. And that is true in Africa, it is true in mass America, it's true in the Middle East. It's true here in the Asia atly in Southeast Asia, particularly for example, in Southeast Asia, where Russia is perceived as an Islamic friendly country as opposed to the worst these narratives. They carry a lot of weight. And the way that art has worked in lastin America's a good example. They really have played to the strength speaking to particular audiences, looking at particular countries where they are more accepted, for example Argentina, Mexican Vinetuela. It's been very, very effective. You have some fantastic examples of the types of slogans that are associated with art in your story. One is question more. You also mentioned that one of Artie's favorite talking points is there are no good guys and no bad guys, which is perially similar to something we heard here in the United States back a few years which I won't repeat. How did and how does RT deal with international news? So for example the Giljan protests in France or the Black Lives Matter demonstrations here, it tends to view and this is true by the way of I see in different languages, it tends to be The contents is different, it is produced differently, it has a certainly different focus, but the way they deal with it is recently similar. So there are sort of three types of dues on art. One is the sensational and this is particularly true on social media. So these a lot of sensational content. It could be violent in the US, it could be a volcanoes, it could be the viral type content. That's one. The second is um us content and content from Western countries that shows dysfunctions and shows that these systems don't work, and shows that multicultural systems have problems and serious ones at that the Black Lives Matter occupy a Wall Street June in France. These were absolutely brilliant for them. In fact, it is such good work that they were nominated for an Emmy. So um these are these are very important. Yes, these the narratives that they fit with their view. I mean, one really good example was the January stick, where are t actually doesn't have to do anything. They just played the images and it really just said this does it look at the chaos that is in the Western world, the last of conservative value use. It's violent, but they just needed to show the image and they do that quite a lot. And I think the third bucket with international needs viewed through their lens and Russian needs, but that really tends to be in the minority. You have to wonder how much staffers know, or how staffers feel about working at places like that. Are they completely on board of everything? Do they have to sign nondsculture agreements? For example, they do have to sign nonsculture agreements. There is a different setting between the people who worked for ACTI early on and then as it continued and they became more apparent as the channel itself changed. But I think it's important to understand the people that are see services, and they generally hired young people, people who are desperate to make it in the media TV. Is there absolutely cut urate world. It's not hard to understand why very generous offers that actually made particularly early years, was very appealing. I mean a lot of people also less to be clear in February, including some of their strongest forces. But so yeah, people make complicated compromises. I think there's a lot of people probably no, no, no, where we're in the you know we work, and that people were able, especially we're still employed, would say no, we're still able to do the same reporting that anyone else does, which find a little bit difficult to believe, just in terms of editorial priorities. You make the point in the story that Vladimir Puddin is going to use r T in order to get through the sanctions and the impact of the sanctions on the Russian economy. Explain what you mean by that theory. I think it's says a wider strategy as the Russian government has. But you know, as it is increasingly isolated from the West, it needs to find alternative markets. It needs different alternative political partners, people that you can do business with, also people who can stand by it in security Council votes, the United Relations and at the G twinity. And so that's where the emerging world is so important. And in particular non aligned nations. You have those countries like Eritrea or Nuganda that you know we'll fall behind Russia. But more important for Russia are those who purport not to take aside, so China, Brazil, Indonesia, India, these are really important countries for Russia. In the bulk of that in America, bulk of Africa that Russian needs to keep on side. And if you look at the countries you have in post functions, I mean the large proportion of the chiefs we have not Yeah, that's that's for sure. And we'll see in November what happens in Indonesia. Tie this all together for us, what else is available to people given that Vladimir Puddin cracked down on media and so many of the international journalists that were based in Russia had to leave. I think it's important to distinguish what the audiences that I see, how such primarily internationals. There is our T in Russian, but it isn't really used domestically. It is primarily other intentions. It does have echos internally, so for example, arts Twitter content or artis editor in chief wid Simon and can be used for domestic propaganda purses and they are She's very very prominent hawkish voice on Russian television, But Russian propaganda on Russian TV for domestic consumption is just much more sort of out there, much naked in its narrative, and these sort of more outrageous things that are possible for the Russian TV presented, which is a little bit more international in this approach. Bloomberg Opinions At Clara Ferrera Marquez, you all know Shuli Wren. She covers Asian markets and regularly discusses China's economy and markets with us. Well. She finally got to travel around the Southeast Asia again recently after a long hiatus, A trip to Vietnam produced some fascinating insights about what two communist countries can learn from each other. Socially. China is slowing. The question we don't know yet is by how much Vietnam, by contrast, is growing quite healthily. Both communist countries, though obviously not carbon copies in terms of their ideologies, and obviously there's huge difference as we know in terms of GDP per capita, population size and so on, but in terms of governance at least truly tell us what Vietnam is doing differently to China that's benefiting its economic prospects. I think the biggest difference with Vietnam so far is that Vietnam seems able to self correct from its pastistics. Believe it or not. Hoim City basically the commercial herb above Vietnam. They also had a really harsh lockdown for four months last June or the way to September, and the military was out amiss, reports of full shortages and untreated medical illnesses. And what happened before that was that Paranoya was also like China, they had a lot of national pride. They wanted to build their own vaccine, but because of the Holciming City they locked down. They decided that their vaccine was just not working, and they started taking vaccines from everyone from Mastras, Anaca, Visor Moderna, even from China's Sinal firm. Basically whoever whichever contrade that was willing to donate the vaccine through the diplomacy channels of the w h os Kovacs programs they were taken. They even asked them some electronics to somehow source vaccines for them worldwide. As a result Vietnam's economy, they are fully reopened these days. If you want to go into Vietnam, you don't have to show your vaccine record or have a negative PC artist. You can just go because they feel like they're pretty confident that the whole population is vaccinated and they have pretty effective faccine in the population, so they feel pretty good about that. Whereas in China and these days, coming from Hong Kong, we have more flights to hold Shimi City than to Shanghai. In the month of August, there are only two flights operated by a Cafe Pacific from Hong Kong to Shanghai. That's just ridiculous. Well, and As a result of all this, Vietnam is actually looking towards seven percent growth this year. We know the China's five and a half percent target is, as you actually put it on this show, fantasy at this point. But the other difference is that Vietnam went all in on stimulus. So fifteen billion dollars worth of fiscal stimulus and an easy monetary policy in a world where central banks are really turning, hawk is particularly fed, how is this working out for Vietnam? So for Vietnam, I don't think it's working out very well on the ground. One complaint you hear from investors and the Vietnamese themselves is that even though the government has pledged a lot of stimulus, like infrastructure, your building, you just don't hear construction sounds very much like infrastructure has halted, and that that's actually stopping Vietnam from growing faster. I mean, Vietnam right now, it's targeting seven percent, which is quite good by global standards, but it's nothing compared to say, two decades ago, when China was growing over ten percent during China's export board. So I think Vietnam can do better on infrastructure spending. Still a pretty phenomenal figure. Though for a country just out of COVID, what are companies doing? Are they looking to Vietnam as a potential base as opposed to China or maybe even in addition to China. So I think at this point the companies that are only talking about China plus one. So a lot of companies, like Apples supply chain, they're looking at bidding for industrial land in the northern part of Vietnam, like Ya Hanoi, in part because it's closer to China. Perhaps you know, supply chain is just a little bit better, and in part because multinationals do want to diversify out of China. But one thing that I have to say though, is that you know, like for the Boding electronic supply chain, the supply chain is very very long. You have to have everything basic materials, chemicals, acid or even construction materials, and the Vietnam doesn't seem to have that. And then when you talk to people on the ground, they were saying, yeah, I would like to open factories, but I cannot even find the aluminum window sills still have to somehow important from China. So you do you do here? That's one bottleneck that the economy itself doesn't produce basic industrials. And another thing is the infrastructure. They just feel like, oh, the roads are very very slow. The government can be building faster highways. You know, Homing City didn't even have subway. Right now, there's one big highway called the North South Expressway. It's pretty much stopped. If you want to do like express package from Hanoi to Hochem City, it can take four days, whereas in China even today it will be pretty fast within a day. Who or what policy is to blame for that, truly, because you would imagine it would be pretty easy and even cost efficient to get flights in the are also to have ports built up and down the vast coastline. Is that not happening? So Vietnam is also doing anti corruption campaign just like China. The General secretary he started his un president the third term last year and he's worried, you know, with all this one party route there. They want to ensure the legitimacy of the Communist Party and he has been cracking down and tech corruption. And then like all the officials, they're just very scared. They just they are not even proved, uh, like infrastructure projects because construction costs has come up. We all not right globally. Material cost has come up. We used to cost one hundred million, will cost like say one million. And if you approve it, the government can suddenly say why are you approving it? Trying to help your friends and family, So like that's the problem. Like anti corruption campaign has slowed down bureaucracy in Vietnam, so it'll be some time before we see the infrastructure build out that we saw in China, and that could make a massive and well, so the other question is how it's been holding up in terms of foreign reserves, which seems to be pretty well, and we know in many emerging countries right now, the problem is foreign reserves. Currencies have been weakening as the dollar has been strengthening, and some frontier markets are having to beg the i m F for loans and meet all sorts of requirements and so on. But in Vietnam they're near a record something like a hundred and ten billion dollars right now. And yeah, the Vietnamese dong has been depreciating, but the central bank has been able to keep money market stable by selling foreign currency. Does that continue? So I think that the Enamese government is very nervous about the dog and then about any talk of its weakening effects reserves because there is a lot of water components in it. What happens is that, say, like if you look at the Vietnam, it's actually dipping into a current account deficit now because the growth boy economy is flowing pretty fast. Right, So what was happening right now is like say, at the beginning of the year February March, the outlook was rosier. So the likes of them song, I don't know. Fun some they have imported a lot of electronic components into Vietnam, so that was a big boosting import and now suddenly they're stepping back on the end production and demand, so they're not exporting as much. As a result, Vietnam is actually falling into a trade deficit instead of what we imagine would be a surplus. So the government is very nervous and the Vietnamese they don't like it when the down depreciates too fast. It is a problem that the Hannoi is facing right now. Surely, more generally, can other countries, not just Vietnam, not just even Southeast Asian countries, but can other countries copy in some ways. For Vietnam is doing and take away China's manufacturing shine, I think the other countries they have to be very brave because what China has done is that it has build up tremendous infrastructure network and the supply chain network through that. I mean, we all know China is one of the world's most indebtict countries. So for you to take away China's manufacturing power, you not only have to have broad, well connected infrastructure network as well as a big industrial base. So basically you have to be willing to take on that like of your GDP. So unless countries are willing to do that, I think it would be kind of difficult. Inflation it's not as much of a problem in Vietnam as it is in many countries obviously, but certainly it is a little bit more of a problem than it is in China. At the moment, we're looking at close to four percent for Vietnam. Our authorities keeping a close eye, yes, and then I mean China station could have been a lot worse. Right now, the end demand is not so good. So like if the Chinese and economy goes back to normal, like the inflation would be a lot higher, and the government is quite nervous about that because China overall inflation has been pretty stable for like twenty thirty years or so. But here and there you you see a little bit of spike in the pop prices, vegetables, fruit, and also we can go back to nine what happened during nine nine. That was when China the really high inflation and pretty low employment outlook and government nervous. Well exactly, we got a warning from Presidentia and being on inflation, which was actually quite a surprised But at the same time we're seeing the central bank engage in a little bit of monetary easing. There's the same conundrum going on for China as there is for the United States, growth versus inflation, right absolutely, And then like at this point it just does seem that the COVID zero policy is going to stay in China. The people who are basically executing COVID zero, they are getting promoted, so basically all other bureaucracies will have to somehow accommodate to prop up that COVID zero thing. And that's why the PBOC is easing a little bit. It's like a stimulus light I guess stimulus light. I love that well, except for Hong Kong, though shually know the city isn't exactly adhering to COVID zero in the same way that mainland China is. We also like to say we are the hair to COVID zero, but we have a little bit bleeg way, so we also have COVID zero lights. How Kong is trying to open up because it's not working. The economy really is not working. So right now we have three days of hotel quarantine plus four more days of Hong Kong, and we are trying to do a little bit better. Bloomberg Opinions Shuly Wren don't forget listeners. Get in touch via Twitter, I'm at Volley Quinn or email v Quinn at Bloomberg dot net. Opinions and comments always welcome, and we're also available as a podcast on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast platform that does it. For this week, we're produced by Eric Mollow. Until next time on Bloomberg Opinion