Israel-Hamas Truce Enters Final Day; Remembering Charlie Munger

On today's podcast: 1) As the truce between Israel and Hamas enters its final 24 hours , negotiators from Qatar, Egypt and the US are pressing for an extension to try to secure the release of additional captives and avert a resumption of a war that erupted almost two months ago. 2) Charles Munger, the alter ego, sidekick and foil to Warren Buffett for almost 60 years as they transformed Berkshire Hathaway Inc. from a failing textile maker into an empire , has died. He was 99. 3) Billionaire investor Bill Ackman is betting the Federal Reserve will begin cutting interest rates sooner than markets are predicting. Full transcript: Good morning. I'm Nathan Hager and I'm Karen Moscow. Here are the stories we're following today. We begin with the war in the Middle East. This is the final day of an extended six day ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. The Palestinian group handed over a dozen more hostages last night, ten Israelis and two citizens of Thailand. White House National Security spokesman John Kirby says he hopes the ceasefire can be extended so more Americans can be freed. I don't want to I'll give you a handicap here on this or bet nods. I can just tell you that we want to see all the hostages out. The way to do that is these pauses. My White House spokesman John Kirby spoke with reporters outside Air Force one CIA director Bill Burns is and caught her for talks about extending the ceasefire. Secretary of State Anthony Blincoln will be back in Israel later this week, and in a post on ex President Biden called for an end of the fighting. He says Hamas fears nothing more than Israelis and Palestinians living side by side in peace and now Nathan the financial world. EA is mourning and remembering the life of Charlie Munger. Munger, who helped build Berkshire Hathaway with Warren Buffett, died yesterday at the age of ninety nine, and we have more with Bloomberg's John Tucker, John and Karen with wit, wisdom and one liners. Charlie Munger served as Warren Buffett's alter ego, often telling it with brutal honesty what wouldn't work. Munger was known for steering Buffett away from purchasing what Buffett called cigar butts mediocre companies had a puff of smoke left and could be bought for very cheap prices, and instead favoring quality. A lawyer by training, Monger recalled how he was steered toward investing when I met Warren. He immediately started telling me how much better his way of making a living was than mine, and that I was too smart to stay in such a silly businesses law practice when I could go into his business of running an investment partnership. And it took me about two or three years to realize he was right. His death, Lee's Buffett without his law time sounding board for investors, maybe his most enduring legacy is Berkshire's performance under their management. Berkshire average an annual gain of twenty percent from nineteen sixty five through twenty twenty two. I'm John Tucker, Bloomberg Radio. All right, John, thanks, of course. Charlie Munger is also going to be remembered for his roles as straight man and scold of corporate excesses at Berkshire's annual meetings in Omaha. Bloomberg Intelligence Senior analyst Matthew Pallasola remembers Monger's special relationship with Warren Buffett. They're recalling individual meetings that they had, you know, forty fifty years ago, and Bussett is forgetting a couple of things, and Munger's reminding him of, well, this guy said that, and we said this, and we made this much money in these meetings. I mean it was, you know, truly a partnership for all of that time. And their interaction was just amazing. They would finished each other sentences, and Bloomberg Intelligence Senior analyst Matthew Pallasola there. Charlie Munger died yesterday at a hospital in California. He was a longtime resident of Los Angeles. Well Nathan, we turn to the market, specifically the economy now and billionaire investor Bill Ackman, who's betting the Federal Reserve will begin cutting interest rates sooner than markets are predicting. I think there's a risk of a hard landing if the FED doesn't start cutting rates, you know, pretty soon. So I think the market expects sometime middle of next year. I think it's more likely, probably as early as key one and Bill Lackman added that he's not convinced the US economy is headed for a soft landing. The billionaire investor made the comments in an upcoming episode of The David Rubinstein Show. Here to Beer Conversations on Bloomberg Television. Well Karen Bill Ackman's comments come as two of the fed's most hawkish rate setter signal they could be comfortable holding rates steady for now. Here's what FED Governor Christopher Waller told the American Enterprise Institute in Washington. I am increasingly confident the policy is currently well positioned to slow the economy and get inflation back to two percent. Chris Waller's view as echoed by a fellow FED governor, Michelle Bowman, who said she remains willing to support great hikes if inflation progress stalls, but she did stop short of endorsing an increase next month. Well. In Washington, Nathan, the House of Representatives may be voting on whether to expel George Santos today or tomorrow, and Bloomberg's Ed Baxter has that story. Motions in the House have been formally introduced, saying ethics findings violate the accepted policies of the body. Now, many of those members who voted against the first one November one, are saying they will vote to expel now, and Santos has responded saying the body is just theater. I went to San Diego last week. It is terrible, terrible. That's what we should be putting our energy on, not on censuring one another, expelling one another, which hunts against the political class. Nobody cares. Congress has forty eight hours to act under the resolution. Ed Baxter Bloomberg Radio, Okay and thank you. President Biden won't be there, but Vice President Kamala Harris this is attending the COP twenty eighth Climate Summit in Dubai. We get details from Bloomberg's Amy Morris. Harris will join Secretary of State Anthony Blincoln and other US officials at the two week event that begins tomorrow. She is expected to address the summit this week. Formal negotiations at COP twenty eight will center on the response to warnings that countries are falling short and cutting their emissions, and possible commitments to phase down fossil fuels in Washington, Amy Morris, Bloomberg Radio. All Right, Amy, thanks for the Incorporate news and a surprise memo. Jack ma urged Ali Baba Group to correct course civilionaire call for fundamental change across the company he co founded decades ago. Ma has mostly stayed away from day to day operations since twenty twenty, and Ali Baba wants China's best candidate to become a trillion dollar company is trading at a fraction of its peak in twenty twenty. Time now for a look at some of the other stories making news around the world. For that, we're joined by Bloomberg's Amy Morris. Good morning, Good morning, Karen. Congressional negotiators are reportedly ready to drop plans to use the annual defense policy build of Titan controls on US investment in Chinese technology. Sourses tell Bloomberg that House Financial Services Chairman Patrick McHenry is effectively blocking a measure that would require firms to notify the government about certain investments in China and other countries of concern. The Biden administration meanwhile getting pushedback from auto dealers on those mandates for switching over to electric vehicle production. Bloomberg's Nancy Llons has that part of the story. The mandate calls for two out of every three vehicles sold in the US by twenty thirty two be battery electric, but nearly four thousand auto dealers, who are calling themselves EV Voice of the Customer say most car buyers, even with incentives, are disinterested in the technology due to the higher cost, the lack of charging stations, and the loss of driving range and hot and cold weather. The dealers are asking President Biden to slow down and let the battery technology and infrastructure improve before forcing EV purchases. The White House says the proposed standards are not a mandate and do not ban gas vehicles in Washington, Nancy Lyons Bloomberg Radio Republican Congressman Anthony Disposedesposito made a motion on the House floor to force a vote on House Ethics Committee Chairman Michael Guests resolution that would expel Congressman George Santos. Minutes later, Santos took to the House floor himself to defiantly say he will not resign. Are we to now assume that one is no longer innocent until proven guilty, and they are in fact guilty until proven innocent, Or are we now to simply assume that because somebody doesn't like you, they get to throw you out of your job. The House Ethics Committee report alleged Santos used campaign cash to pay for personal expenses. He's also facing federal charges. A US military Osprey aircraft carrying eight people as crashed into the sea off southern Japan. The Japanese Coast Guard is heading to the site for search and rescue operations. Host Guard official says they don't have details yet about what happened to the osprey nor to the people on board. He says the Coastguard received an emergency call from a fishing boat near the crash site off Yakushima. The osprey was believed to be heading to Okinawa. Global News twenty four hours a day and whenever you want it with Bloomberg News Now. I'm Maybe Morris and this is Bloomberg Karen. All right, Amy, thank you well. We do bring you news throughout the day right here on Bloomberg Radio. As Amy said, but now you can get the latest news on demand whenever you want it. You can just subscribe to Bloomberg News Now to get the latest headlines at the click of a button. Get informed on your schedule. You can listen and subscribe to Bloomberg News Now on the Bloomberg Business app, Bloomberg dot Com plus Apple, Spotify, and anywhere else you get your podcasts. Time now for the Bloomberg Sports Update, here's John stash Hour John Darren. The NBA started this season with an in season tournament to drum up some interest early in the regular season, taking a page out of what you see in European soccer. Last night they determined which eight teams are advancing to the knockout round next Monday. In the East, Boston will play at Indiana, and then on Tuesday it's the Knicks in Milwaukee. Monday in the West, New Orleans and Sacramento, followed the night later by Phoenix at the Lakers. The winners will advance in the semifinals December seventh in Las Vegas, with the championship on December ninth. Minnesota Timberwolves have the best wrecker in the West. They won last night. They're thirteen to four. They're not advancing, but the Knicks are. They beat Charlotte one fifteen to ninety one. The Celtics moving on. They're eight to zero. At home, they beat the Bulls one, twenty four to ninety seven. Jalen Brown scored thirty. Milwaukee got thirty three from Jannis on to the compo in a one to thirty one to one twenty four win at Miami College Hoops and the sec ACC Challenge the SEC one four, including twelfth rank Kentucky beating eighth rank Miami ninety five to seventy three. We heard from the College Football Playoff Committee. Time we'll hear from them will be Sunday with the final four announcing who's going to be in the playoffs. Georgia's rank number one. Michigan, with the big win over Ohio State, moves up to second. Everyone moves up a spot. Washington now third, Florida State fourth, Oregon fifth. Washington plays Oregon on Friday for the pac twelve Championship Ohio State. With the loss dropped the sixth John Stasheward Bloomberg Sports from coast to coast, from New York to San Francisco, Boston to Washington, DC, nationwide on siriusxam, the Bloomberg Business app in Bloomberg dot com. This is Bloomberg day Break. Good morning. I'm Nathan Hager. On this final day of an extended six day ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian militant group is handing over more hostages and pressure is building on both sides to see if this pause in the fighting can be extended even further. For the very latest, let's go to Tel Aviv and check in with bloom Israel Bureau chief Ethan Bronner. Ethan, it's good to have you back with us. What are the prospects that we could see this ceasefire extended beyond today? Hey, Nathan, I think the prospects are pretty good. I think that both sides have been comfortable with this pause, they would like it to extend. I think it's a breather for Hamas, it's a breezer for the Israeli defense forces, and also it allows more humanitarian aid to get into those in great need who are suffering from hunger and the outbreak of disease in Gaza. And of course it's bringing back to Israel hostages. So the deal is, you know, ten hostages a day, another day of a ceasefire, and it seems like that could go on at least two more days. Will it be a ceasefire or could it be a resolution to this conflict? We've seen commentary from President Biden himself one of his latest posts on the social platform X saying that Hamas fears nothing more than Israelis and Palestinians living side by side. To continue down the path of terror, violence, killing and war is something we can't do. Is pressure building to end this war? It is? And that was an interesting tweet. I don't know if you still call it a tweet. An interesting post on X by the President which suggests that he is slightly moving away from a full embrace of an Israeli continuation of the war. I think it's a little hard to tell. The Israelis very much want to destroy Hamas, and they believe they can, and they believe they must take this opportunity to do so. They believe that they want to get as many hostages out as possible and then go back into war. It is clearly the case with the President and many many people abroad think that the war has should stop. Too many people have died, too much suffering has occurred. And I think that politically President Biden is worried. He's also facing internal dissent in his own administration. But you know, it could also be that they sort of thread this needle in the way that allows the Israelis to go ahead in some days time, but in a way that is more targeted, there's less civilian death, and that allows them to declare a victory. We shall see. Are we seeing that play out in the thinking among Israeli officials leaders in Israel that we could see a more targeted approach and what would that look like? Yeah, and what would that look like is a great question. We are it's very very hard at the moment to get any transparency on what the next military phase will look like. When you ask, you're told, sorry, pal, we're not sharing it with you. But it is clear from public statements and also from pressure from Washington, that they have to reduce them the kind of bombardment that began in these first weeks of this. This is now almost an eight week conflict, and it is clear that they want to go after the leaders of Hamas and it's military infrastructure. They are saying that they've killed about five thousand Hamas guys. They were saying there were about thirty thousand of them, So you know, from their perspective, they've made progress, but they've hardly gotten everything they need. Now, what would it mean to go in a more targeted way. You're going to have two million people sort of crowded into the southern part of Gaza. I don't know how you're going to go get underground there without killing people. So I don't know how they're going to do it, but that's clearly something the Americans are demanding of them before they let this go forward. What do we know about the hostage releases that are expected today, Well, we know that these rulis have been given another list of ten. Again, only women and children have been and gate involved in these exchanges so far, and I expect there'll be more women and children in the next day or two. Then the question is would they get to some men, some soldiers and that's I think a more difficult thing. So far, it's been three Israeli three prisoners Palston prisoners for each hostage. That may have to change. Yeah, we do know that there have been talks underway and caught her with the CIA director Bill Burns to potentially get that ceasefire and hostage deal extended beyond women and children, something else for us to follow. And no, we will be doing that as well. Ethan Bronner, thank you so much for being with us this morning. Ethan Bronner, Israel bureau chief for Bloomberg News, joining us this morning from Tel Aviv. And now we want to bring you our conversation with the founder and CEO of Pershing Square Capital, Bill Ackman. He says the Fed's going to cut rates sooner than many of us expect. Bill Ackman joined Bloomberg's David Rubinstein for peer to peer conversations. They discuss the FED, the outlook for the US economy, and the twenty twenty four presidential elections. So let's bring you part of that conversation right now. I do think the economy is weakening. We're seeing evidence of that in some of our companies. You're seeing I have some concerns. There's been a huge subsidy in terms of low interest rates and companies. Most companies fix their rates or their debt at very low rates, and certainly real estate investors did the same. And that works until it doesn't work, And so I think we're what's going to be interesting is to see what happens when people get have to reprice their debt, and I think that can have sort of a cliff like effect, and you're certainly seeing that in real estate now. The markets are assuming, and the markets are not always right, but the markets are assuming that there's going to be a FED discount cut sometime next year. As we talk now just about the end of November. It's not clear what the Fed will do. But some people say that the Fed, if they were to cut interest rates next year year, would help the Democrats and therefore be seen as very political. The other hand, some people say the Fed can't wait till after the election because the economy might need a stimulus. So you have a view on what the Fed is likely to do. I think they're gonna cut rates, and you know, I think they're gonna cut rates sooner than people expect, because you know, what's happening is the real rate of interest ultimately, which is what impacts the economy, keeps increasing as inflation declines. Right, So if the FED keeps rates in the sort of middle fives and inflation is you know, trending below three percent or you know, that's a very high real rate of interest, and I think that is having a sort of retarding effect on the economy. And then of course, again you know, many businesses and certainly many individuals have the benefit of fixed rate debt, and that fixed rate debt, certainly for companies and for commercial real estate, starts to roll off. So I think there's a risk of a hard landing if the FED doesn't start cutting rates, you know, pretty soon. So you know, I think the market expects sometime middle of next year. I think it's more likely probably as early as key one by its own and miss and the FED probably missed inflation initially they said it was transitory, but they played catch up and they've increased rates considerably since that time. Do you think the FED made a mistake in not handling inflation differently at the beginning, And how do you think they've done since they started increasing interest rates? They certainly made a mistake. I mean, I think they would have FED generally as an institution, would admit that. I think that they caught up and effectively. So you give them credit for acknowledging the mistake and being pretty aggressive. And then I think, you know, you want to make sure that they're you know, German Powell's desire not to have a legacy of causing or contributing to long term inflation, doesn't, you know, cause them to make the opposite mistake, I mean, keep rates too high for too long, and I think the market expectation is you know, called it middle of next year, July something like this for the beginnings of easing. I think the economy will likely demand an earlier move. And I don't think of the FED as a or at least this FED, a particularly political institution. I think they're really trying to do the right thing. President Biden has called his economic program biden Nomics, which has met some derision in Republican circles. You've been an active supporter of Democrats, I think more than Republicans. Is that right? I would say historically I have you know, I would say today I certainly consider myself and have for years now a centrist, okay, and I'm much more open to Republican candidates that I am to re electing President Biden. So I you know, you would say otherwise. You know, again, I want to elect the best leader of the country, whether that person is a Republican or a Democrat. But you haven't publicly said you're supporting President Trump if he's the nominee. Ye. I've been supportive of you know, I've been supportive of Nikki Haley. I've been supportive of Chris Christy, I know, the vag Ramswani and I was, you know, pre his launch of his candidacy, I was, uh, you know, supportive of his having a young, smart, talented, uh you know, business leader as a next president. He's just been a little too far off, too far to the right, and also been disappointed a bit with his you know, geopolitics and how he's thinking about dealing with some of the wars that we find ourselves in the midst of today for the economy itself. Do you think it really is going to make a difference if President Trump is if he's the Republican nominee it gets selected, or President Biden is the Democratic nominee he's selected, who either one. Would it make a big difference for the economy in the next year or so if either one is the president or the economy is going to do what it's going to do. You know, I do think leadership matters enormously in everything from the economy to geopolitics, and I hope we're going to have a broader selection than Trump and Biden. There's actually an interesting candidate who just announced his candidacy on the Democratic side that I would say, no one has heard of a congressman named Dean Phillips. You probably have heard of him, may know him. Met with him recently. I was impressed. I think the best I think Biden done a lot of good things, but I think his legacy will not be a good one if he if he is the nominee, I do think the right thing for Biden to do is to step aside and to say he's not going to run and create the opportunity for some competition of alternative Do you think that I think that I think he's past his prime in kind of meaningful way. I think the global security, I would say, and is going to become a very high profile issue for I think the country. I think people are concerned about what's going on in terms of Russia, Ukraine, you know, the Israel Hamas situation. You know, Russia and China are pretty belligerent today. Our relationships are not good. So I think you know, you, I do think of It's a bit like being CEO of a major company. It's a it's a it's a full time job, and you need to be at your you know, you need to be strong, you need to be at your intellectual best. And I don't think Biden is there. This is Bloomberg Daybreak Today, your morning brief on the stories making news from Wall Street to Washington and beyond. Look for us on your podcast feed at six am Eastern each morning, on Apple, Spotify, and anywhere else you get your podcasts. You can also listen live each morning starting at five am Wall Street time on Bloomberg eleven three to zero in New York, Bloomberg ninety nine to one in Washington, Bloomberg one oh six to one in Boston, and Bloomberg ninety sixty in San Francisco. Our flagship New York station is also available on your Amazon Alexa devices. Just say Alexa Play Bloomberg eleven thirty plus. Listen coast to coast on the Bloomberg Business app, seriusxmb iHeartRadio app, and on Bloomberg dot Com. I'm Nathan Hager and I'm Karen Moscow. Join us again tomorrow morning for all the news you need to start your day right here on Bloomberg Daybreak See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.