No deal. So what is the deal more than 24 hours later? Still no response from China after trade talks in Washington and Without an agreement, but we do have an update from the president United States Here's what we know right now Massive tariffs are close to kicking in and stocks on all street are still being kicked up and down our Consumers on Main Street next welcome everybody. Happy Saturday on the old Kavuta and thoughts on top of a trade war That's pretty much putting everyone on edge We've got Edward Lawrence in Washington where the talks went down Ellison Barbara at the White House on what the president is teeing up Lawrence and I had a Macy's in New York City where shoppers may soon be paying up and Brian Duncan in Polo, Illinois Where farmers like him are already paying a price and a big one. We begin right now with Ellison. Hey Ellison Hi, Neil. Yeah, the Trump administration increasing tariffs on 200 billion dollars worth of Chinese goods President Trump saying this morning the way to avoid those tariffs is pretty simple He says that people should make their products in the USA President Trump also tweeting this quote over the course of the past two days The United States and China have held candid and constructive Conversations on the status of the trade relationship between both countries the relationship between president Xi and myself remains a very strong one and Conversations into the future will continue in the meantime the United States has imposed tariffs on China Which may or may not be removed depending on what happens with respect to future negotiations? The administration increased tariffs on roughly 200 billion dollars worth of Chinese imports upping the level of tariffs from 10% to 25 China Commerce Ministry says countermeasures are coming China's top trade negotiator Chinese vice premier Lu He suggested talks have not failed instead. He says this is a small setback I Don't think the negotiation has broken down on the contrary I think it is just a small setback in the talks between the two countries, which is inevitable We are still cautiously optimistic for the future The US trade rep ambassador Robert Lighthizer says more tariffs are coming in addition to the tariffs increased on Friday Lighthizer says President Trump told him to begin the process of raising tariffs on essentially all remaining imports from China Which are valued at approximately 300 billion dollars? Lighthizer says there will be a period of time for public comment before a final decision is made when it comes to those tariffs again From President Trump this morning. He says in his words It is very simple an easy way to avoid tariffs make or produce your goods in the good old USA Neil all right. Thank you very much. I was involved the white as we should explain here Yeah, they do have a little bit of wiggle room here because there is a delay In the implementation of these tariffs for goods and transit here and those that have not left China yet So two to three weeks presumably regardless though Fox business that were gloren so many outside Macy's in New York City with what consumers might be having to deal with in those three weeks Lauren You know, this is the largest store in the nation the largest department store and consumers here consumers everywhere are getting ready to spend 767 dollars more this year That's a number that's being put on it because of this increase In the tariff and this is being put on a thousands of items that you can buy in stores like Macy's everything from backpacks and Handbags to furniture and clothing Luggage perfume dinnerware nuts shampoo all sorts of food now some folks that we spoke to here Neil they're willing to accept this short-term pain for the long-term gain In the long run It's gonna benefit us as you as consumers because someone has to be tough and actually hold the line with the Chinese with these tariffs I'm scary. It really is. There's a lot of little people that are really gonna be affected by the fact that They can't afford these things that were affordable yesterday I think it will affect all types of different businesses and especially I'm in retail overall if it would help I would be okay. I would probably Just stop spending as much and we got to play fair and I think that's what Donald Trump is trying to do if I have to take a Hit to improve our country in that way, then I'm happy to do it But what happens if all of the imports to this country are hit with the tariff as the US Administration's office is now preparing to do well the trade partnership That's a group that studies trade policy and its impact They say that will cost a family of four two thousand dollars a year and Neil That might not be so easy for Americans to bear The other thing is this even if we do get a trade deal with China That doesn't mean the tariffs come off back to you. That's right. Now. There are no guarantees of anything right now Thank you Lawrence of it at the outside Macy's in New York City All right, the US and China still again nowhere close to a deal But what is the global impact of all of this keep in mind with the markets crazy volatility? Two trillion dollars of market wealth evaporated over the past week here now that may be quickly made up We saw the big comeback in the Dow through the week And certainly yesterday when we were down more than 358 points to come back more than a hundred and 14 When all was said and done so let's get a read on what investors can expect in the days ahead We've got stockswish founder Melissa Armo We've also got L.D. and wealth management's Michael Lee and Fox Business Networks Jackie D'Angelo's Jackie Anna with you You know when you talk to people and talk about the mood and all of that I'm always amazed by the relative calm of investors of average folks who seem to think this too shall pass So we'll get over this so there does seem to be a kind of a Contend that don't worry everything will work out. Well, there's optimism in the marketplace right now, right? We ended the session on a positive note White House saying the talks have been constructive and investors want to believe that The market saw a little volatility this week though because it had priced in a deal And that didn't really seem to be the right decision to make at that point So it was a little bit in shock this week that the president was taking this kind of hard line But most investors that I spoke to said the retailers they're gonna be able to adjust They already absorbed the 10% like you mentioned there's that gap of three or four weeks They'll be able to be a little bit more nimble and they've moved around They are already sourcing and trying to find new suppliers to make this work on the other side of things It is gonna hit the consumer But consumers do say the president is playing this long-term game and we understand that the markets driven more by the short-term headlines You know Melissa We're gonna have Walmart's former president on and Walmart would be in the direct line of fire This goes so much of what it sells comes from China But even there the understanding seemed to be that they were stocking up their shells to prepare for this Which might have explained, you know the strength of the first quarter GDP report that a lot of people were prepared for this Are they well, it's interesting you bring out Walmart because I was gonna talk about this of the top four companies Fortune 500 companies guess what number one is it's Walmart and guess what two three four are Chinese companies owned by The Chinese state state grid synopac group and China natural petroleum and their own by the Chinese government So you have to remember that it's state owned enterprises many of these companies over there The Chinese government owns a portion of them So the Chinese government is going to support some of the companies over there that are having a problem whereas over here It's different obviously companies are their own Walmart targets Amazons of the world Well, the government is going to come in and help Walmart Understand so there is going to be a pain and suffering here if the tariffs continue and let me tell you this This is not over by a long shot when they said a month ago. This is gonna be done I thought no way is this gonna be done This is going to get so much worse before it gets better and the worst it gets with the closer We are to a deal so when they said oh well They renamed on this and that that doesn't surprise me at all The Chinese want to make sure they get the best deal possible and in order to do that They're gonna squeeze and squeeze and squeeze to make sure so what has to happen It's to speak to biggest most economies in the world to big powers. It's like a marriage You have two powerful people a husband and a wife You have to have a compromise and the problem is that the US is saying we want it to be more fair for us But China saying well, yeah, but this is the way it's been for the last however many years What do we get so unless the Trump administration can come up with something to give is a compromise for China I don't think a deal gets done anytime soon. So they have to be creative I don't think the markets would flip over that kind of uncertainty Michael. I could be wrong But I you're optimistic that cooler heads eventually prevail, right? Well, they have to right Well, I know they have to but there's just too much at stake And so what you need to understand is the Chinese economy is essentially a house of carts, right? So we're up in arms over Deficit that's 4% of GDP their deficit is 10% of GDP and their current account deficit went negative for the first time And so they needed more than we do you're exponentially more than we do you see Their currency is essentially monopoly money. They've printed 30 trillion dollars of R&B since 2001 So they live on dollars euros and pounds So they need the direct foreign investment and what these tariffs not only hurt are exports They really really hurt direct foreign investment Do you want your supply chain coming out of China knowing that there's going to be the potential for 10 or 12? We're already seeing some companies preparing for that a lot of them going up to other countries in Southeast Asia like Cambodia Thailand would have you to compensate for what they lose out of China But you know Jackie, I'm curious stepping way back from this whether there's a silver lining here in the United States Interest rates have gone down the past two weeks and particularly this week So if you're shopping for a home or trying to refinance the one you're already in the odd thing about this crisis Whatever you want to call it is that it's made that a lot more affordable. You're absolutely right So as long as rates stay low and as long as the economy keeps chugging along the way it is It's actually in a really strong point Michael and I were talking about this in the in the green room That actually 3.2% GDP for the first quarter. That was a huge number That positions us well to take this hard line Look, there hasn't really been another president that's been willing to to go on the line here and put everything at stake again For that long-term gain and to sort of put China in its place It's something certainly that needs to be done But there's going to be some pain to come and that You know what's interesting to listen to you talk about when we've absorbed the 10% tariff That was in effect on these 40 to 50 billion dollars worth of goods now It's 25% on 200 billion plus could be 25% on everything we got from China You can absorb 10% you can work with your suppliers to try to eat the cost of that not pass it on the consumers It's much tougher 25% I'm telling you it could get worse than that not only could it be 25% Trump might actually have to threaten 50% of everything and I'm I'm telling you this from experience you have to understand the Chinese culture You have to you ever hear the one grain of sand thing everybody going out I'm telling you it's the culture they want to be number one and for the united states There's so much more here at stake because you have north korea over there with china This is this is so much bigger than just the tariffs everyone's saying so on the line You're not after this is this settle any time soon and you think there's more pain to come in the interim Yes, but I want to talk about the market really quickly the market is going to The market's going to rebound after this quickly But when it gets really bad, which I don't think we're at that point then the market's going to have a sell-off All right, but michael the president's doing the right thing by by by getting in china's face on this But it's just going to take a while Over the last so the department of defense the trade representative's office have estimated that china steals on average Two to three hundred billion dollars of intellectual property a year from the us That's two to three trillion Over the last decade and this business model of stealing ip to avoid paying into rnd for chinese companies Has to you got to get them to stick to that Yeah, well, I guess that was the sticking point in this trade. You gotta give them something. You got to give them something They want that's a compromise. That's an amount All right, we're gonna have a lot more on this same subject By the way, it's not just china We've got sort of like global hot spots he got pretty much everywhere No more so than when it comes to the iranians of the north korean not even that as well It's a scary world bit by bit. We're gonna sort it out for you. Stay with us


Here's an effect where we have an object going across the screen as a transition. Notice how to the left of it we see one scene, but to the right we see another. I'm going to show you how you can make this with Blender. Okay, so here's how I made this. There are three important scenes here. S1 is just a cone that goes up and down like this. S2 is this monkey head that goes around. And transition is where they're all put together as a transition. So here's how I did this. First of all, we need to make sure that all of the scenes are the same length. S1, S2, and transition are all 50 frames long. Next, we need to make sure the transition has a transparent background. It's under the film. You might need to expand that. Click. So here's how we're going to make this. We're going to go into the compositing workspace because we are going to composite the three scenes together. So check use nodes, and then you'll see this compositing workspace come up. If we hit F12 now, then it will run through the compositing workspace. Of course, it'll be no different than usual because by default, we just render the layers and composite it. However, we want to do something more than that because we also want to put S1 and S2 behind it. So first of all, we are not going to directly do something in the compositing workspace, but instead we are going to render out S1. Okay, I'm done rendering that. Now let's mask at hit plus VFX masking. And this brings up a masking workspace. But we're going to mask out the part of the video that's displaying S2. So that way we can use the mask to figure out which part of S1 is displayed and which part of S2 is displayed. Hit open, navigate to where you rendered it to. A to select all the images and open clap. And now if we go through this, we'll see the video clap. From here, we just need to add masks to this in order to make it so Blender knows that here is S1 and here is S2. Let's go to the beginning. And initially everything is going to be part of S1. So we are just going to add something in here. To display everything and hit I to keyframe that. And on this frame here, you'll notice just a little bit of the next image S2 is being displayed. So I'm going to grab this, double click there to add in curve handles. And now that part isn't included in the mask. It doesn't matter whether or not where the line is. I'm just going to adjust this on here like it could be here or here. It doesn't matter where. Now I'm going to keep going. Oh, make sure to keyframe it because I just forgot to keyframe that there. And now that erased my work. Luckily I can just quickly add that back in. Okay. So now at this frame, everything is we're entirely in S2. So now if we go through this, we'll notice that we cover the whole thing with the mask initially. And then at the end it's not covered at all, which is what we want. So now that we're done with the mask, we can go to the compositing workspace to composite the layers together based on where the mask is. Now if we can move this over and insert a alpha over node. And I'm going to move this to the other one. I'm also going to set up a viewer node just so we can see what we're working on. Go to image editor, select the viewer node, and you're not going to see anything yet. That's because we haven't added a viewer node. And we can use a rewrite node just to make this a bit easier. And now we're seeing what's going to be composite it. It won't always update instantly. If we go here, we won't see it immediately. But if we hit F12, not all render that out. And if you look here, it'll update. But it just doesn't update as you see. Okay, now we're actually going to add in another alpha over node. So color, alpha over. Here we're going to be combining the S1 and S2. So if we go add input render layers, change that to S1. And also add in one for S2. Now, right now, if we combine these, they will just go on top of each other, which is not what we want. Because then they don't, because we want to have part of S1 and part of S2 displayed, but not at the same place. Right now, S1 is just taking entirely over S2. Luckily, we can use the fraction part right there in order to control that. Like if I do 0.5, then you can see part of both. But we want to make it one at some point and zero at other points for both of these. This is where the mask node comes in. So make sure to go this and select this. It'll say F mask. If you look at the masking tab, we called it mask. You can call it whatever we want. Masky. So going back to compositing. Compositing. Now we can drag in this mask. And that'll make it so whenever the mask is zero, it'll display nothing. And if the mask is one, it'll display something. Now we can actually look at what this mask is by dragging this here. And you'll notice as we play along, oh, you can't play it like that. But you'll see how the mask is whenever that's black, that's a zero. And whenever it's white, that's a one, which is what we want. So let's drag that in. Uh, if you see something looking weird like that, that's just because the transition scene hasn't rendered but hit F12 and it should update. Here's what my final render looked like.


Okay, very good morning to everyone Monday the 4th of May. I hope you had a great weekend and Quick quick shout out to Jennifer and Tobias in Sweden. Thank you for watching. I got your message over the weekend and Enjoy your breakfast, but Quick thing then to look at before we begin the overall assessment of the charts and a general look ahead for the week This is the calendar from the macro menu Again always a super important process for our traders and the way definitely that I kind of plan ahead for the week is I put together or construct this calendar and Obviously for anyone who does trade there's lots of different calendars that you can see but mainly comprised of just economic data I think one of the important things that I try to do is aggregate across several different calendars So not just trying to pick out the kind of main economic data points, but also in terms of any speakers So for example on Tuesday, you've got fence Bostick Bullard Evans George ECB's merge So trying to look at central banks media kind of calendars also put on geopolitical calendars You've got things like the UK and US trade talks happening on Tuesday For example things like that that won't generally appear on your normal standard forex calendar So hopefully that's useful I'm going to drop a link to the whole report that I write every Sunday called the macro menu in the video So if you need to read that in your own time, please do but we'll we'll circumvent background through this session To look at some of the highlights, but first of all, let's just have a look at the charts And what have we got going on today? So a little bit of risk-off tone Seemingly a little bit of a pickup in the political sparring between the US and China That's really dominating the news flow this morning And I'm going to give you an example of what's being said and my thoughts on that But as I said a little bit of risk-off so slight gap down seen here in US futures So I'm just going to flip this over to the DAX for a second So the DAX is down about 335 points But if you're looking at the US indices, particularly the NASDAQ already technically You've got that low that we printed on Friday just coming up to a touch on the late Asia Pacific session And we're coming back up to that point now and as Europe come into the market Pretty similar setup so for the other US indices And of course comes after a down day was seen to kick off the month of May So obviously a lot of people banding around the statistics about the seasonality of that Kind of sell and may go away a little bit early I'd say to start thinking like that But certainly to kick off proceedings this week You can see then that equities lower, gold and T-notes both up $8, 8 ticks respectively Or be it off their highest points Oil also as well Just breaking that trend line that I was keeping an eye on from last week Obviously last week was the first week in four where we've had a positive move higher And boy was it a positive move It was a huge gain in the front month June futures contracts You know basically doubling in value in that respect So we've broken that we've come back down and technically then we're just trading back around Levels which were the low on that trend line test Failed break initially before the push-up seen on 30th and then corresponding with those high seen on 23rd 27th So quite an interesting level here already holding in the overnight Asia Pacific session We're trading just about 30 cents or so above that at the moment, which is broadly the $18 handle So worth keeping an eye on that as well Over supplied fears coming to the forefront again. There's been a latest Bloomberg survey Which we'll take a look at but basically looking at the fact that in April a lot of the Kind of competing for market share meant that production values were particularly high So in the currency space then with the the kind of moderate risk-off tone Dollar's a little firmer the Dixie is trading about a one-third of a percent So it is pressurizing both major currency pairs Euro-dollar and cable both off around circa 45 pips or so at the moment All right, well, let's get into some of the stories Before I do just remember to like and subscribe to the channel Be very much appreciated many more updates coming of course like this every morning And I've also got a couple of plans for some other kind of trader interviews and things to come So don't forget to subscribe to the channel But looking at the new stories then for this morning And this is kind of the main headline reading and don't forget Japan if you are kind of looking at the overnight Volumes Japan is out of the market pretty much for the entirety of the first half of the week They don't return until Thursday and China was also out overnight. So things a little thin as well But this is what we're looking at and it's kind of continuation on from last week Trump promises conclusive US report on viruses China origins Now a couple different things here Trump administration according to Reuters is basically turbo charging an initiative To remove global Industrial supply chains from China as it weighs new tariffs to punish China and Beijing for its handling of the coronavirus outbreak according to officials familiar with the US planning now interestingly The president or two points one the president declines to criticize G This has been quite a common thing that we've seen Trump very willing to criticize China But he hardly ever if ever at all has criticized Xi and obviously Xi is at the very top of this This kind of power structure in China, and I think that's quite a telling sign personally I actually think that you know the Chinese culture criticism gets taken You know very seriously, and if it was to the absolute, you know kind of the top guy in China I just think that that's just not going to fly and that's where actually you get a lot of The real repercussions of how China might react But as long as she is not the target and it's broader China as strange as that sounds I think then that this this fits that narrative that what Trump is doing is purely political at this point And I think although he's playing Fairly precarious game, which if miscalculated could go very badly I actually think that that is a telling sign that the fact that he's kind of exempting Xi from the criticism Even though we know Xi is the leader of that country So the two you would think would be associated, but you'd very very rarely hear Trump calling out Xi Specifically the other thing is as well the administration So Pompeo obviously just backing up Trump talking about enormous evidence You know this was a talking point the end of last week, but there hasn't been really any evidence force coming as yet So for me, why is all this happening? Well, I think a lot of this is happening because of this From a timings point of view. This is looking at the change in payrolls and the US unemployment rate And of course this data is due this Friday This Friday will get the latest of what will be the first real Insight into the tangible impact for the mass layoffs that have been seen in America Due to this capturing then that main point of the lockdown that's been seen nationwide So the expectation is for the headline change in on farm payrolls to be minus 21 million the range is minus 28 million to a best-case estimate of minus two and a half million the unemployment rate as you can see at the bottom is expected to Surge up to fourteen percent is the median estimate with a range of five point one To twenty one percent So how much is this going to impact markets? I actually think very little Because it's been very well telegraphs been talked about a lot. I think a lot of this was the The cause of that big volatility seen in markets in March. Remember markets are forward-looking in this respect So I don't think the data in itself is going to be a massive thing for markets to digest, but I think this Underlines why Trump is doing what he's doing. I was talking about this in the macro menu I've been tweeting about this this morning for me. This is pure tactical Diversion tactics from Trump. He knows that this is going to be Absolutely broadcasted around the world in global media as the worst situation since the Great Depression and That's bad for him in a political year Particularly in the run-up to the election. So what does he do? He tries to use? Diversion and deflection tactics. It's not my fault. It's the Chinese virus fault And therefore you get a lot of finger pointing in order for him then To come out of it with a narrative in that sense. So what else does he mean saying? Well, he's actually come out as well the president and He has said on Sunday. He now believes as many as a hundred thousand Americans could die in the coronavirus pandemic Now this is after he previously said a week ago that his estimate was 60 to 70,000 So, you know huge revision upward as well and this comes with Already his previous target being topped as the death toll in America now is coming up to 70,000 already At this point in time. So again, I think for for Trump. It's about Setting the net the scene that you're gonna have a shockingly bad economic situation Reflected in these numbers albeit from a market trading perspective. It won't be that much But politically potentially very damaging And then you overlay that with a much more higher death toll than he had previously said So cue the anti-China rhetoric in order to try and cause a distraction For the general public. So, yeah, all of this at the moment I think is is the the political machine on Capitol Hill in full flow What else is going on while Trump has said that? Basically they need to pass a further stimulus that must include a payroll tax cut But the only problem there is obviously that's all well and good for people who are employed But what about the 21 million people who no longer have a job? They're not going to benefit from a payroll tax cut and hence the reason why It's been difficult for him to push this one through but again, this is another thing that I would be expecting to Compliment the the anti-China rhetoric would be more pledges of fiscal stimulus from administration again All of this is to appease and manage the general Public sentiment over the handling of this situation So that's kind of the the Trump situation. So obviously that's no fear of kind of retiring of a tit for tat and more tariff Tariffs coming on board and already obviously a challenging economic situation under the pandemic has made people a little bit nervous to get the month underway But as I said, how much of this is true and how much of it are idle threats? I'd say for me, it's more the latter at this point in time But certainly warrants monitoring the situation very closely The other thing as well that's kind of reared its head North Korea's fired shots at South Korean guard post in the D Miratorized zone or the DMZ the buffer separating the two countries on the weekend. I don't think that's a Big deal, but obviously more confrontation on that front Is it's just generally not good for sentiment overall Let's have a look at a few other headlines oil as I mentioned it has gapped down a little bit And we're down about a dollar and a half at the moment in price Oil drops of optimism over demand waning and the face of a huge glut And what they're talking about here is this OPEC production jump by the most in 30 years last month So let me just scroll down. Here's the Bloomberg graphic So production saw by the most in three decades last month as you can see here. So really interesting. Yeah as the world was Um, kind of at the beginning of the year under a bit of pressure with the ongoing trade war Then obviously this this pandemic started kicking in Well, we already saw Chinese consumption diminishing through february when they were on lockdown Shortly after the Chinese lunar new year Then the pandemic began and then come to the global spread of the virus And that meant that obviously there's been a huge blow to demand Irrespective of that though given the adjustments from these oil producing nations tend to be slightly lagged Then they were pumping, you know an enormous amount So you've had almost this overnight global collapse in demand And yet that's why the adjustment and why prices have been so volatile and in a negative way for crude oil prices Because of these fears of this overall glut So even though there's been a few tentative signs and that was helping support prices in wti last week about a bottoming out in regards to the oil consumption situation this Has brought about new Concerns and obviously gets overlaid with any increase in us-china tensions, which is going to be another kind of potential Situation which could could weigh on overall economic performance if that was going to Unfold in a worst-case scenario way and that would obviously impede demand again in that respect So yeah a couple things to watch out for I think the the idea or the threat then of This kind of negative pricing and oil to the degree of which we saw those massive fluctuations just a few weeks ago I think the the probability of that is way lower now Discussed as many times before this kind of spreading of in particular the the united states oil funds exposure Across the the kind of the futures calendar now It's going to help offset that but but certainly given the The size of the rally last week a little bit of a pullback lower I don't think would be the most surprising thing if that were to be the case and certainly a little bit of that unfolding this morning A quick look elsewhere. I'm just going to have a quick look at the earnings situation And we we are still in the midst of of earning season in the u.s There are 148 companies reporting two of the dowl 30 One thing I would say is although there's quite a populated screen here or a table of the most anticipated earnings If you're a macro trader well most of the biggest largest cap or industry titans They've already reported obviously last week was particularly key for that for the technology names amazon apor microsoft facebook and so on This week They're much smaller. It's kind of more mid cap names But certainly quite a few coming out. So from an index moving potential Perhaps going to be superseded by some of these other bigger broader macro themes on the virus on the us china tensions Particularly if trump does indeed start to ramp things even further On that rhetoric ahead of the anticipated Negative payrolls that we're going to see on friday and from a european side of things It is worth noting if I just quickly scroll down There are a couple of european large cap names though to be aware of I've wrote a calendar here on the macro menu. So tuesday quite a french focus from the cat corant. You get a total bmp paraba wednesday nw the automotive maker credit agricultural soc gen thursday at uslim et al and friday one of the dax giant seamen's reports as well So worth just noting that onto your calendars The other new stories at the weekend that were quite dominant certainly if you're if you're based in the uk was this idea about How as the uk government going to start relaxing? What's the roadmap to the relaxation of the The lockdown measures that have been in place for the last couple of weeks now. The reason why this has been quite a dominant news article over the weekend is because on the 7th So this thursday we're going to hear from the uk government about their their update So what does the relaxation of these rules look like? and some of the things that we were seeing were Staggering of shifts amongst proposed new guidelines avoiding hot desking Avoiding face-to-face meetings two meter distancing enforced by floor tape Social distancing quantities of sunday times will mean that it would leave commuter trains with only 15 percent of their Usual capacity until more Relaxed rules come into place. So The the reality kind of coming home here that is going to be certainly for white-collared workers Probably several months before we get anywhere near Normal working practices and I would probably say that's not going to probably happen until the new year at this rate from uh, I mean that's fine from a political point of view from a from a Government side of things while two sides to look at really One is the government in the uk has a has a five point plan. So trying to anticipate When what and how long These loosening measures start to kick in I think you could use this as a reference point Or be it I would say that the uk government themselves has changed their five point plan wording Quite a few times over the recent weeks. So it does tend to change Hence the fluidity of the situation. So what the government are saying about the What's going to happen in three weeks time? I would take with a degree of a pinch of salt because At the end of the day, you know, we are dealing with a situation where the virus in itself will be volatile in nature And as such then we're still learning at this point and therefore subject to Probably changing tactic as we go forward in time. But from from a starting point I think this is what you've got to look at then from a market's perception Because that's what you guys will be more focused on The main things I'm looking at are really a three point plan Which is the the shape and severity of a second wave upon reopening And of course, then I'll be looking at the five point plan to determine Then about the timing around this point one And then point two the implementation of large-scale testing to better monitor and control any secondary Breakouts, you know, if they can't do testing on mass, then there's no way that they're gonna anytime soon Be relaxing in multiple steps in a fast way Then three where the governments can continue to support the economy over the long term if As is becoming quite apparent now in in much of the Different countries in mainland europe and in the uk. This is going to be a long drawn out route back to Normal behavior for the public and and the way of which people work. And so therefore The economic rebound is going to be gradual And that means then that governments more than likely will need to continue to offer more support The question mark have come is, you know, their capacity to do so and their political appetite to continue to offer more assistance as well Given the fact that governments obviously loading up more and more debt and ultimately these governments Typically in a western democracy tend to be quite short term focused because they need maximum pay off for the now Whether or not they can continue to to do that Which i'll see of course, I mean in in italy if you read the press this morning their Conteers getting quite a lot of backlash about his plans for the relaxing of rules, particularly in regards to small businesses And again the summer is approaching whether the temperatures are going to start to pick up People are probably going to get in terms of the public A higher probability of them flouting the rules So it's going to be interested to see how the governments can handle this going forward And obviously this thursday we can get the latest update from the uk We're also going to get from the uk the bank of england rate decision That is coming out as well on thursday do be aware they released a press statement Last week saying that they're going to release their interest rate decision at 7 a.m Normally, it would be at midday now the reason why they're doing this and what i've read at the weekend is to accommodate the publication Of the interim financial stability report They're basically want to release the same thing or the same two reports at the same time So you get the rate decision you get the financial stability report And you also get the quarterly money monetary policy report or otherwise known as the inflation report from years gone by Then andrew bailey the now governor of the bank of england He's basically going to brief reporters after decision and the contents of those discussions will then be made public at 10 a.m So it's a little bit of a different format actually than what you're probably used to so do be aware of that if you're going to be trading things Up the pound You're going to be seeing that statement come out at 7 and then more comments a bit later on from the governor Now how much of that or how much can we expect from the bank of england? I would say not not a great deal I wouldn't expect them to start Adjusting their quantitative easing program for example I'd be expecting them to do something in a similar ilk to what we had from the fed and the ecb Which is kind of talking about the prospects of potentially doing more in the accompanying meetings I in the summer at that point they're going to be armed with a lot more information about how then The economy is responding to the pandemic Given that it's going to represent then the biggest economic part of the downturn Throughout that month of april and then how is the unwinding going as we're going forward in time? so I think it's very much a Setting the scene meeting For future action if it's deemed necessary situation And i'm sure that they'll be continuing to do like what christine lagarde was asking Which is that governments need to continue to provide as much fiscal support to complement the monetary actions that have been taken already So that's pretty much it. I mean the calendar fall today These were all final readings in terms of the pmi's that have been coming out later on this morning You've then got an update on the The kind of pandemic purchasing of bonds from the ecb later on this afternoon then us factory orders It's kind of the main data point expected to show again Downward figure in reflection to the fact that this is encapsulating much of the The month of march from the us so again if you go on to Either one of my twitter account I tweet it on a sunday or i'll put the the link into the video Here's the full macro menu. So I talk about the uk a bit more detail about some of the things i've just discussed The bank of england talk about payrolls earning season And there's the full calendar for everything you need to be aware of for for this week But hopefully that's enough to just get you started make you aware of the fundamentals for the week I would say overall some of the main things that i'm looking at or the main thing i'm looking at is How far does trump push the envelope with this whole china In us situation. I think he is going to push it further And I think this is all a political attempt to try and and distract and move away from any Accountability being put on his doorstep So that does provide a bit of a near-term risk for markets particularly just given What a rise that we had through last month in the equity space does leave equities generally a little bit susceptible to pull backs Like we've been seeing Over the last two sessions or so, but having a look here For this morning just finally on the charts I'm just keeping an eye the nasdaq has broken now above that Technical key point which was that previous low And the high of the age of pacific session so a little bit of a further follow through and you can see the the relevance of that level going back as well to The 28th So a little bit of an extension of those gains The s&p just testing that same level and the dow just coming up to it at the moment So all in all a little bit negative overnight perhaps slightly faded back As europe have come in the trump china thing needs to be watched How much of it though from what i'm saying is actually a real tangible threat to markets? Perhaps a lesser extent because I think people see through the veil that is trumps political posturing to some degree All right guys, that's it. I'm going to wish you a good week ahead any questions. Let me know And have a good session ahead. Thanks


Nice to have you back with us. This one is about how important it is to use a different timeframe to confirm your play. Spy was dropping and we were looking for a bottom. Where is that bottom? That's the big question. Depending on how long you wanna hold the play, you need to switch to different timeframes to see where that support is. It's really important that we get into the play where support is. Doesn't matter if the trade looks over sold. If there's no support, it will continue to drop. So, see all this long set of red candles at about 1015. It hit the 200 EMA, which is the green, dark green line, and then it started dropping. We look back on the same timeframe. This is five minute. See this bottom? I'll show you on this line. This is pre-market. I tend to use pre-market because it's a gather of a lot of different tickers, and although there's not much volume on that, it shows you that a lot of people were interested in that play. Spy for that instance, at that level. So basically, I was looking at that line, and if I look back, I'm like, okay, this was the low of a Wednesday morning, and people started to get interested into the play at that level. I was expecting the whole thing to bounce there, but before I get in on something that was pre-market volume, which is super low, I switched to the one hour chart. One hour chart gives us more time, and we could look back. So I looked back, see? And oh, there it is. There's a top. It was a previous top on Wednesday the 27th to the 25th of August. We got to a top, and I was like, okay, this was the previous all-time high, see? Previous all-time high before it started wrapping up to where it is now. So I was looking at it. We had the drop that occurred pre-market on the five minute, so I was like, okay, this is support. However, you see that there are other support lines just to confirm a little further down. So I was under the impression that no way we could have flushed through, let's say 46 on that. We were at least going to see some sort of a balance on or very close to that 449, 39 line. Now, you all see this on the left side of the screen. You all see this old resistance that became support on this pre-market candle. Now, it did continue to go a little further down to let me show you where to this line. See this black line? I'll remove the yellow line here. Here it is. So it came down to this line. Now, this is exactly what it did. Show it back on the five minute here. It came down precisely to that. So you see that using different timeframes, you could use that one hour in this particular case that showed you that there was a while back, there was an area where it created resistance. So resistance is an area where people start selling at that point. Anything higher, they're happy to go and hold, but anything lower and not super happy, they're going to sell. So that creates an area of support for in case of a draw, right? And this is what happened today. It dropped precisely to that line and then it started ramping up. We went to the 450 calls, thinking we would at least rise to 450 and then some. My final price target was 451, which we got. It was a little heretic, but we managed to get, I believe it was 79% on the play. Yes, I entered a little early. I entered here on the yellow line where the bounce was. However, final support was shown on that black line, which came from a little lower than anticipated, but still you could tell that there was plenty of support on the one hour chart a little further back. I was not, see here, the black line shows that there was an old resistance line, which becomes support for our purpose on the daily trade. Now this was same day expiration because we were expecting a bounce that was short. We weren't looking for much, but when you play same day expiration, rewards can be pretty good. Obviously risk is higher. However, if you anticipate the move, knowing where support is and when you are okay to sell, in this particular case, first target was this one here, see this resistance, I'll get rid of that black line for you here to make it easier for you to see. So see this yellow line was a bounce right at the gate and it used the same line for resistance. However, I was under the impression that we could get all the way to that 450-82 and see this is pre-market support and it acted as support again where we acted it. However, I was under the impression, like I said, my final target was 451. I believe we got just a little higher than that. If you see 451-13 was the high of that rise and then it started slowly turning down. However, what you need to remember is this, when you go to find a bottom, please confirm with a different timeframe, looking back. It could be further back, but if you look at a weekly, it's not going to tell you much if you're playing spot. However, if you look at something that is a little closer to what you're playing in this particular case with a one-hour chart, it can tell you a lot about where support and good resistance can be for your playing. Hope you learned something out of this. Keep practicing. Look at charts, draw lines, and please don't forget to subscribe and hit the like button if this was enough for you. Thank you for watching, folks, and we'll see you in check.


So we're just really excited to be here. I know many of you have been here for a few years. Some of you are new But for us, it's really amazing to be here leading organizations that have been doing this work for in the Kaisima Organization more than 30 years and Willie more than a decade to talk to us for a few minutes about What it really takes to make impact investing work and specifically we just wanted to talk about three things what we do What it takes for it to work and then most importantly What are we learning from the doing of it many of us for many years have been talking a lot Writing listening But it's a rare opportunity to learn from a doer like Willie and I'll talk about what my team does as well My sense is that it's so cap. There's always three kinds of people on impact investing. There's haters Who really believe that what we're doing either is crazy or destructive? There are hypers who say that everything about impact investing is amazing is going to work really simply And then they're doers and I really think of Willie as an amazing example of a doer from whom we can learn I know you guys have been sitting for a while. So that's what I want to stand up and it's really quickly if you characterize yourself as a doer Stay standing if you're a hyper or a hater or hopefully something else have a seat Get a sense of who we are I know none of the haters are gonna you know coming here and being a hater is like going to Yankee stadium as a Red Sox fan Which I've done so you're not gonna own it, but if you're a doer stay standing and if not take a seat Great so we have a lot of self-described doers So maybe we don't have a lot to teach you guys But hopefully we'll be able to share some insights from what we're doing. So just wanted to start and we're a little bit rush But really just starting to talk briefly about what we do I said to Willie early that anyone who comes to so cap and doesn't know what Willie foot does and what root capital is about Maybe should do a little bit more research, but he's not as presumptuous as I am so He insists I'm telling you a little bit about what he does at root capital Then I'll talk a little bit about what I do at non-profit finance fund and then we'll talk about What it takes to succeed and most importantly what it is. We've learned from the doing since we were last year great Good morning everybody Speaking of haters my mother. I mean well my wife hates the jacket and wearing out because it's fake leather But I've worn it virtually every single time I've been on stage or hung out with with Anthony So that's why it's here. Thank you for indulging me Super excited guitar at home. So those of you know about that will be appreciated excited to be back at so cap and what a wonderful theme Igniting vibrant communities just quickly kind of laying out what we do at root capital So we're we're an impact first agricultural lender and enterprise accelerator if you will We Mission is to grow prosperity in rural areas right in poor environmentally vulnerable places and we do that by investing in Agricultural businesses that build sustainable livelihoods for small-scale farmers who often lack, you know, the very basics clean water electricity Medicine so specifically we lend capital We deliver financial training and we strengthen market connections for small and growing Agricultural businesses so we're kind of we're a social purpose ag lender really the combination of a non-bank financial institution and an NGO That we founded 15 years ago to address the missing middle of real finance right businesses that might aggregate Or serve hundreds or thousands of farmers, but they get stuck in that missing middle too big for Microfinance too small too risky too remote for the banks and really we start from the conviction that these agricultural businesses Whether they're a farmer association or a private entrepreneur that's working with small holders Through say outgrower schemes or a seed company or an agri processor They're an economic engine that drives prosperity in rural areas And the challenges they get stuck in the missing middle so they can't access capital or qualified employees or markets that they need to To grow their operation or invest in infrastructure or merely pay the farmers on time Right so they they're missing out on good business opportunities and too often they fail to flourish so we've grown pretty quickly in recent years and a lot of challenges there but this year we're on track to lend a hundred and fifty five million dollars to an active portfolio of nearly 300 businesses that Reach roughly five hundred thousand farm households across 33 countries And so including for instance 2.5 million dollars that'll go to four businesses Representing 18,000 coffee farmers in the Congo in the eastern DRC and so just maybe to wrap Regardless of how much we lend or where we lend the larger vision is really to try to catalyze a small holder agricultural Finance industry that serves all five hundred thousand. I'm sorry five hundred million small-scale farm households in the world and we'll do that by Demonstrating business opportunities in the countryside with many others and crowding and competition and this is a more recent thing and awkward But very powerful working with our peer institutions aka our competitors to Blueprint this nascent industry of small holder agricultural finance and create the kind of Standards and best practices that will underpin a thriving agricultural finance market that That is stable. That's sustainable That's responsible. That's inclusive Hopefully that you know that that ignites vibrant communities, right? So what Willie's been doing for 15 years at root capital, which is really combining capital and expertise To unlock the potential of his clients who are these cooperatives and other Organizations that are enabling farmers to get the most value out of their work Is a real parallel for what we at the non-profit finance fund have been doing for 34 years here in the US Where our clients are non-profit organizations? They are health clinics homeless shelters soup kitchens charter schools Performing art centers all of whom similarly are being hampered by their inability to access the right combination of the right kind of investment capital and the Expertise that they need to run their organization as an effective business and so we began in 1980 in New York City And you probably figured out that I'm young enough that I when I say this it's with a bit of a wink But I always say you know you remember in 19 the late 1970s that the oil price had spiked I don't but I think some people in this room do not too many people though looking out But the oil price it spiked in 1970 and a lot of the old homeless shelters and settlement houses in New York City Were built in the 20s and 30s by the first wave of philanthropy that had come to New York And those were old hulking buildings that were incredibly energy inefficient in 1980 They came to their funder the New York community trust who had funded them for years and said our heating oil bills have gone up We need a bigger grant to cover our increased costs because that's what nonprofits did they covered their costs by going to foundations Getting grant money going to governments and getting contracts the non-profit finance fund was born out of a very simple But powerful idea that rather than going and getting another grant from the foundation What those organizations really needed was a loan to do two things Put a new boiler in their basements that could be more energy efficient and put new windows in the buildings That would trap their heat and with that loan. They would be able to Reduce the amount of heating all they needed to the extent that they could repay the loan and end up with a better capitalized Organization that's a really simple idea and now we call it green retrofit finance and everyone's excited about it back then It didn't have a name But it was something we started doing but it was also a really radical idea because the premise was that a non-profit Organization could access finance and think of itself as a business that had revenues and cash flows That could ultimately support a loan and that's the idea. We were born out of in 1980 And since then we haven't grown as quickly as Willie has but we've done about 320 million dollars worth of lending we've made 700 loans never lost a dollar of our investors money And last year lent across the country to a wide range of organizations pursuing that basic understanding that as a non-profit organization That's mission oriented You don't need to be excluded from the capital markets and from the opportunities that investment capital has and on the other hand as Investors are the people we borrow from who we are paying back have bought into the idea that they can make investments that support both The social purpose they care about as well as their financial return So that's what we do and Willie and I over the years have had many conversations about the surprising Parallels between our work despite it being on the face quite different in terms of the kinds of clients we fund and Specifically where we work and so we just wanted to talk briefly about What have we learned from all this doing about what it takes and what does it take to make this work? And why can it be powerful? So yeah for us Success factors, maybe We could go into I think a whole host of Success factors about our own shops that for us would be for instance embedding deeply in local Talent and local markets and local culture being as close as possible to your clients Building deep industry expertise, but I want to share I think the most important point That's relevant for a soak up would be the following that for us success has been all about identifying the early-stage agricultural businesses that have Huge potential for impact economic social environmental But that face a ton of challenges that if addressed they become an engine of prosperity for countless rural kind of households and The challenges are Daunting if you take subs here in Africa, you know governments on average spend 5% of national budgets on agriculture Even though it's the primary economic activity of 70% of the population So massive underinvestment in agriculture has left the continent in Africa Decades behind other developing regions so as much as anything our journey at root capital has been kind of a Process of continual discovery and understanding of the constraints to business growth and success and since not just that say the firm level weak financial management for instance, but weak sourcing channels from farmers dependent on NGOs for inputs and technical assistance, right poor infrastructure You know bad roads unreliable electricity crappy cold chain the usual host of inhibitory laws and Regulations and subsidies and taxes so in short. It's really tough To serve that lower segment the lower end of the agriculture finance market And I would say over the years in this probably the most relevant comment maybe I have to share today in terms of our if not success factors our experience is that Critical thing has been not Overpromising and not overselling that lots of good and lots of deep impact will happen without real risk and cost and Even in some cases significant subsidy and we like to joke on our team that we're at the high risk low return sweet spot of smallholder agricultural finance and what we mean by that is That you know on the continuum of where mainstream markets meet Clients needs efficiently on one side and on the other where economic realities dictate You know exclusive reliance on charity We are squarely positioned in the capital preservation camp like paying a small coupon Combined with rigorous impact measurement But also raising enterprise philanthropy to build a balance sheet and for capacity building and for industry Facilitation and always always are the view toward reaching those earlier stage businesses and helping to unlock their growth and their Impact in spite of all the challenges and just one last point on this and maybe this is like a call to action But for for those of you who aspire to reach those least-serve market segments, and I hope many of us do Consider what we call the cross-sub city model where in our case we are building The a pipeline of early-stage businesses for ourselves and for the larger industry Knowing that those early-stage clients are going to be typically loss leaders at first and then we accompany their growth right over time to the point where We achieve operational sustainability through a cross-sub city from the larger clients that are profitable to serve and so we're not maximizing return necessarily at root capital, but what we are doing is helping to ensure that this agriculture finance market is Inclusive in addition to being stable and sustainable and and responsible. Yeah, I think it's really true And I've heard Willie say this before that knowing who you are and being clear about that is a really important success factor And and I joke that the impact investing is like a wedding. Those you've been in it at soak after a few years We'll know that we were earlier. We were in this sort of Weird phase after the ceremony when everyone's standing around they're passing around on doors But you don't know who's in the bride's party. You don't know who's in the groom's party You're not sure who you should be talking to and it's quite chaotic and in that moment Everyone can sort of present to be something different different people So you talk to one person you say I can deliver you market rate returns Then you talk to the foundation you say I'm all about impact now We're moving into the seated dinner phase where you get to look underneath your name tag and you see table one and table one You're sitting with Willie and Willie's about I'll preserve your capital I'll deliver incredibly strong impact and I'll do the really hard things and that's where we are in the US side Over in table eight are people who are managing fiduciary money with the Rissa compliant pension funds who are doing something different We need it all and you wouldn't have a wedding party under that tent if you didn't have everyone But I think being really clear and not trying to Deal with that confusing period by trying to pick yourself in too many ways too many people has been very helpful for us in our work We are absolutely in that same camp as Willie We haven't lost our investors money and we can't because of who we borrowed from we borrow from the He's lost a little bit of our investors money just a little Okay, yes, he has better investors than I do or more more lenient But I think certainly for us it's you know It's a similar story in the US and we don't have our clients don't have problems with roads And they don't have problems with the power going off all the time that really hampers their ability to operate But they do operate in a crazy system It's a system where at the best of times nonprofits are delivering one or two percent margins We do a survey every year of the state of the nonprofit sector in the US and we can tell you that half of all Nonprofits have less than 90 days of cash on hand at any time That's who we're lending to in the good years if they manage their contracts Well, they're maybe making a slim margin those contracts are often getting upturned for very strange reasons So I think so similar we are finding that in our work to be successful or creates You can't just simply put the money out there and say well come to us people who want deals And it's not just about finding the deals But it's what my team does is not take more risk But work much harder and be much more creative to turn what a regular banker would look at as a completely unviable Deal and work to make it happen and subsidies often a big part of that But there's no substitute. We've also found and this is for me transitioning from being a Hyper of impact investing and understanding it theoretically to running an investment fund One of the biggest things I've learned is how important it is to get into what I call the black box of the clients Rather than just saying if we create the investment fund and there's clearly a capital need those two things will meet They don't meet in a marketplace They meet in the context of a very specific investment you make into a very specific for-profit or non-profit Entity and understanding how that entity works and the pressures that are on that team is the starting point for us to be successful What we do so I see we're running out of time And I wanted to make sure that we got to what I think is the most exciting thing to be here talking about and that is What are we actually learning from doing so what I asked really to think about and I'll offer my thoughts is Since we were last at SoCAP and were you here last year? No, so he has two years. I have one year What do we now know about this work that we did not know in his case two years ago in my case one year ago? Because of the doing we've been doing over the last year. So what are the few things you've learned since last time you're here, Willie? Okay, so I have a tendency to overshare. So I'm gonna overshare a little bit um, I Think what I have learned what we have learned as an organization is How much trouble you can get into if you don't have clear expectations up front? with your investors and your donors about one really key thing which is that you can't Decode everything up front in the face of market failure that we have to dive into this work But with our supporters We need to have room and license to adapt and iterate and if you don't set that expectation very clearly up front You can you there can be serious misalignment. So I'll just start quick story We hit serious headwinds in 2013 as an organization first time ever we didn't grow Largely managing kind of macro forces that were Beyond our control But that can threaten even the best laid strategies So for instance market externalities collapse of the coffee price in 2013 coffee leaf rust disease a Biblical scourge that many of you will have read about that's hitting the Americas with the vengeance tied to climate change The Rising competition from other social lenders. God bless them moving into our space a great thing for market creation Meanwhile, we had recently Undertaken a large multi-year Pre-raise of capital for a debt and grant funding for a five-year strategic plan Which was pretty successful the pre-raise, but we didn't hit our targets last year In terms of volume credit volume in terms of revenue in terms of risk not radically off, but we didn't hit our targets as a result of managing these headwinds and some got spooked and And and pulled out even as others kind of deepened their engagement But the end are kind of successful pre-raise kind of unraveled. So here's what we did quickly Right so we did just because I don't want my communications person is glowering at me right now What we did right last year was we very aggressively communicated and shared our learnings throughout the headwinds with our investors and our donors and our board and everyone else we We implemented lean cost controls But being very careful not to undermine our productive capability in the field where most of our team are local Africans and Latin Americans spread across eight regional offices We focused on voice of customer business initiatives to manage the situation and I think actually got Better much better at serving our clients and then this year the market certainly in coffee the market rebounded and I'll be it with a lot higher volatility in in the commodity markets in general that we need to manage and we were there Ready and standing by to resume growth kind of together together with our clients So two key learnings and I'll wrap First one I mentioned it again You cannot decode everything up front and you really need to have kind of like in Silicon Valley as a tech company You need to have the license and the room To iterate and to adapt to changing circumstances We should have done a better job of setting those expectations up front And we certainly intend to do that going forward Second key learning and this is kind of picking up on some of the themes that Anthony just mentioned and I'll close here We appreciate now that impact investing is much more specialized with a lot more segments Within it then even just a few years ago So you've got government agencies and corporates and foundations and religious pension funds and high net worth individuals and family Offices and so on and so forth and with that comes many different theories of change Right, everybody has their own theory of change and so you have to and that's not a problem But you have to be very careful about aligning your theory of change Even if it's artfully adaptive but not bleeding into chameleon like your theory of change with a theory of change of your of your of your investors And so for instance finding alignment around in our case Financial what's your philosophy behind financial performance right in our case operating self-sufficiency or OSS or break even is a very key driver of internal operational efficiency right and it's an important indicator for Achieving a demonstration effect, but it's not the most important one It's not the only one and you have to weigh it against mission trade-offs in terms of maximizing financial return versus as I mentioned earlier Creating a very inclusive market as a catalyst kind of pipeline builder for our industry another one is in our case We are absolutely in the school of a multi pronged Strategy to achieve impact at scale and so it's inextricably linked finance advice Catalyze lend capital build local capacity through financial management training So folks can better compete in global or local markets and then catalyze an industry thought leadership field-building impact measurement And so on all three together are the three legs of the stool my father by the way said to me once please don't call it a strategic stool But now the less those three together Do you have alignment or people like I don't care about the advice stuff? I don't care about the catalyze test there. They're inextricably linked and lastly Within the factory gates. What's your direct service delivery? What about outside your factory gates? Like what do you do through partnerships? How do you engage at the landscape level? How do you leverage the ecosystem all these things in the face of what is a multi-dimensional very complex thing called poverty? So what I can promise is this year Come back coming back next year We will have learned a lot more and we will unapologetically continue to adapt and to iterate Into next year that's great, and I would recommend I think wheelie and his team are a gold standard in communication And it's all on his website root capital dot org Really great quarterly reporting and are able to convey both the metrics as well as the stories of what they do I'll just talk about what we've learned in the last year I think we've come here and you're gonna hear in a minute about a big policy initiative That some of us have been a part of one of my biggest learnings is the role of government and impact investing in last year When I say I said don't ignore the role of government because government creates the conditions under which we can operate I've really come to appreciate even more. It's not just that government creates the conditions But if you are going to do impact investing, especially in a developed market Where you are trying to assess or address issues of real poverty and social inequality and justice Ultimately, you are going to be investing in organizations that rely on government funding to pay you back That's a huge insight that I've had my team probably had it 20 years ago But a real understanding is not just that we need government to create the conditions of which we as private investors can make a difference Almost all the work we do at some point down the chain We are getting repaid because government is helping to fund a service. It's true in the US It's even more true in Europe and in the developed parts of Asia. So if you are operating in developed markets Let's give you three quick examples We've helped finance a 200-bed homeless shelter on 25th Street in Manhattan a 20 million dollar project We were able to lend two million dollars into it We are paid back because the city of New York and the state of New York are committed to funding those services We are ultimately financing government through the financing of a nonprofit just south of here in Los Angeles We've been financing an amazing charter school that sends a huge percentage of kids Not just to college but gets them to graduate from college out of a high school They've set up they needed money from us to rehab a building and start their new school Ultimately, I'm going to get repaid when the state of California provides that charter school with the revenues They need to Do the education and pay us back. We see this in sector after sector There's a health clinic in rural Hawaii serving a population that previously had no access to primary health care in their community We were able to make that loan help that facility get started Ultimately, it's government Medicare and Medicaid payments are going to make that happen So government and the role of government you cannot be an impact investor and make a difference on real issues of deep poverty And social justice and inequality in a developed market If you do not get really smart about understanding and supporting the flows of government into your bar into your borrowers The second thing we've learned and again I think the investors in this room with more experience than me would say this is a no-brainer It's about the management team when I'm trying to get it I just we got a three and a half million dollar loan approved through our committees And the loan is going to enable an amazing nonprofit to take a state contract And massively expand this delivery of health care into a certain population the state they operate to make that happen They have to go from a 700 person team to a 1400 person team and that's what they needed the loan for They needed upfront money to put in the IT systems the recruiting practices and get that engine going Ultimately, I only got that loan through my committees because we were able to convince the committee that we Absolutely believed in the management team of this organization If you are not backing management teams and you're backing real estate collateral and you can do some great things But ultimately to do amazing work as an investor. You have to understand the management teams I'm the last thing I'll say and we've been told to wrap is My biggest learning last year and I think Willie certainly knows this is true This is hard And this is why I think the the hypers out there are constantly looking for information that affirms their hypothesis that this is easy and inevitable And the haters out there look at any kind of hiccup and say see we were right. This is impossible. You can't do it The main thing I've learned is that this is just really hard to do and there's a lots of ways Elizabeth Littlefield was mentioned earlier at OPIC She's a great line. She says, you know, there are a lot easier ways for me to make money I do what I do at the simplest level what we do we do because we aren't the kinds of people who are trying to do the easy thing That's easy to say and it's hard a lot hard to live with, you know, I think Willie talked about root capital doing cost alignment And that's a euphemism for an absolutely traumatic and emotional thing that goes through an organization that is trying to do something hard And it's not about you know, you feel like you have a failure of leadership But what we do is really hard and I just learned again. That's why I just going back to Accept that this is hard and what Willie said earlier. We are not going to learn by sitting and talking We're going to learn by doing and doing with a humility that comes from knowing that what we do is hard And what we do is supremely worth it So I'm just really excited to be able to share these thoughts and it's always great to be on stage with Willie And very much look forward to hopefully being able to work with many of you in the in the coming years as you Take on this journey and grow with us Thank you. Thank you