China’s Global Moves, Oil Prices & An Economic Shift | Ed Yardeni

James Connor 0:05
Hi, welcome to Wealthion. I’m James Connor. And today my guest is Ed Yardeni. He’s had a very long and distinguished career on Wall Street. He was also an economist for the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. And now he hits up his own firm, Yardeni research. Ed, thank you very much for joining us today. How are things in Long Island?

Ed Yardeni 0:22
Well, we’ve had no snow really, lot of rain hasn’t been all that cold. So so far, so good.

James Connor 0:29
So bad, because you are in the great state of New York, I got to ask you about football. I guess you’re very disappointed about the Giants. Yeah,

Ed Yardeni 0:38
my wife and I are disappointed that they won the last game, because we were hoping they have a better draft pick position, but But what can you do? We’ll deal with it.

James Connor 0:48
Now, I guess, I guess you’re gonna have to cheer on the Buffalo Bills.

Ed Yardeni 0:54
I don’t know if that’s a stretch for us. And

James Connor 0:56
before we do the deep dive on the economy, we have a lot going on in the global economy, and also geopolitics and I’m just kind of curious, with all these various events, if what you most are concerned with or what keeps you up at night?

Ed Yardeni 1:12
No, I think you you got right to it. The the geopolitical issue is front front and center, in terms of everybody’s concerns with what’s going on in the Red Sea, is is unsettling. And the the impact on global trade could be not as bad as what we had with the supply disruptions during the pandemic. But it certainly isn’t going to help in everybody’s effort to bring inflation down. In the short short term, we’ve had a lot of goods inflation coming down sharply. And now maybe that’s going to reverse it for a month or two. We’ll see how long this lasts all lasts. Right now, it’s Lucas’s though the, the war between Hamas and Israel’s turning increasingly into a regional war. So it’s very unpredictable and unsettling, but I’m kind of monitoring the price of gold of oil, I should say that called the price of oil as a way to we’ll get an assessment from the markets of just how bad the situation is. And right now, despite everything that’s happened, the price of oil has been trending down since September 27th. And October 7, of course, was awful day, or Hamas brutally attacked Israel, but things have only gotten worse in that part of the world. And then, of course, geopolitically, we have to continue to worry about Russia and Ukraine. And you know how that awful war is going to play out. And then last, but not least, maybe it’s not even last, but not least is the possibility of the Chinese mainland attacking Taiwan.

James Connor 2:53
And I want to touch on a few of these issues. And in spite of all of these things happening, you’re very bullish on the US in the US markets. And you were recently featured in Barron’s Magazine with a number of other economists and you had the highest target for the s&p Tell us what is your target for the s&p for 2024? And maybe you can tell us why you are so bullish.

Ed Yardeni 3:17
Well, at the beginning of last year, I was quite bullish. And I had a forecast to 4600, which seemed far fetched, but it turned out to be not bullish enough, because we went somewhat above that. Now I’m talking about 5400 By the end of this year, and maybe that’s looking a little less far fetched after the rally we’ve had since October 27. And then in 2025, I think there’s potential for going to 6000. So clearly, I’m not in a recession camp. I haven’t been in the recession camp for the past couple of years. I’m not in it for 2024. And I think the economy will continue to be resilient and grow into 2025. And in that environment, I think earnings could be fairly surprising on the on the upside, maybe up from 220 to 25. Last year, something like 250 this year, and then 270 Next year,

James Connor 4:22
you raise a good point, we’re going to see q4 numbers coming out here in the coming weeks. And it’s going to be interesting to see how the consumer was during the last few months of 2023.

Ed Yardeni 4:35
Yeah, well, I’ve been optimistic and the consumer, you know, I’ve had this sort of glid view of consumers that when we Americans are happy we shop and when we’re depressed, we shop even more so that there’s sort of an automatic stabilizer there. But of course that’s contingent on jobs increasing and decreasing. And so far, the labor markets proven remarkably strong. Longer, we continue to see initial Unemployment Claims ranging around 200,000, just north of 200,000, which is consistent with the unemployment rate remaining below 4%. And we continue to see indicators suggesting that there’s still plenty of job openings out there that should allow for people to get get jobs. And jobs, of course, are one of the source of purchasing power. The other one is wages have been rising faster than prices. Since early last year, real wages are up. And by the way, that’s not sustainable unless productivity is making a comeback, which happens to be my view and at the heart of my optimistic outlook for the rest of this year, next year, and even the rest of the decade. So

James Connor 5:46
let’s dive into the economy. The Fed had its last meeting in December, and they gave every indication that rates are going to be on hold now that we have another meeting coming up here at the end of the month or the end of January. What do you think the Fed is going to say? What do you think they’re going to do? Do you think rates will be in fact, held? You’re on hold? Yeah,

Ed Yardeni 6:07
yeah, well, look, I think the stock market, the bond market got very exuberant, I didn’t know if he was irrational, but they got very exuberant, you know, last couple of months of the of the old year. And one of the reasons for that is, investors concluded that if the Fed was in fact done raising rates, then we have to start focusing on how much they’ll be lowering them this year in 2024. And I think the market started to discount four or five, even six rate hikes this year, and starting maybe even in March, I’m thinking that two to three is all we’re gonna get, because I’m not in the recession camp, I think the economy is going to remain resilient, I think inflation is going to come down. But the Fed is going to be very slow in actually lowering rates, they’re not going to be rushing it. Because the nightmare scenario for them is that after all they’ve accomplished so far, they don’t want to see that all suddenly blow up in their face, with a rebounded inflation again and look with what’s going on in the Middle East, we still have to consider the possibility of a 1970s kind of scenario, the 1970s, we had two energy shocks that lead to Twin Peaks, and inflation. In the current situation, we had an energy shock when Russia invaded Ukraine at the beginning of 2022. And now there’s a potential for another energy shock, if things really get out of control in the in the Middle East, and they’re out of control. Now, what I have in mind is, you know, as I said, the price of oil is going to tell me when things are really out of control in terms of its impact on the global economy. So that’s something to be concerned about.

James Connor 7:56
You made mention of the fact that the economy is very strong, very robust in the jobs market is also very strong. Are you concerned at all that the Fed does want to cut or they’ve given that indication that they want to cut in such a strong environment?

Ed Yardeni 8:12
Well, I think on balance, they’re going to remain conservative, they’re not going to jump the gun and lower interest rates prematurely or too aggressively, they might pull back on their quantitative tightening program, and that might get the markets excited, again, about lots of rate cuts ahead here. But I don’t think they’re going to want to mess with success. I mean, if the economy continues to perform reasonably well, we’re not talking about a boom, we’re just talking about not going into recession and the consumer spend and capital spending remains relatively strong. And let’s not forget, fiscal stimulus is extremely stimulative. So with all that in the background, if they do get progress on inflation, some folks at the Fed are going to say, well, we have to lower interest rates, because if we don’t, real interest rates are actually going up, right? I mean, if the Fed funds rate stays at five and a quarter percent, five and a half percent, and inflation keeps coming down, then inflation adjusted, real interest rates will be actually tightening. And that’s been an argument that some Fed officials have been making. And I think that will persuade them, certainly not to raise interest rates again, because the markets in effect will be tightening if they just kept keep the Fed funds rate where it is. But I think they said, I think they’re going to be slow. And so I’m sticking with a two maybe three rate cuts next this year. And I’m thinking that as more likely in the second half than in the first half. I think the first half for the stock market is going to be a little bit sloppy sideways kind of action, because I think the market did discount, more rate cuts that are going to be delivered. But on the other hand, if that’s if that’s This scenario, it’ll be because the economy is doing reasonably well. And earnings are doing also quite well. So I don’t really see a correction, I don’t see a major sell off. If anything I’m, I see potential for a melt up in the market by technology, but we can discuss that along the way.

James Connor 10:18
So as you said, uh, cutting rates is all predicated on what’s happening with inflation, we recently got a CPI numbers, and they were a little bit stronger than expected 3.4% year over year and 3.9% X food in energy, which I was really surprised with, but what are your thoughts on those CPI numbers? Well,

Ed Yardeni 10:40
you know, we have seen the price of oil and gasoline continue to come down. We have seen used car prices come down according to the wholesale, wholesale price index for us cars. So you’re right, I was a little surprised as well that we didn’t make somewhat more progress. Also, we haven’t really made more progress in rent components, which everybody knows, is a wacky, lagging indicator, and that actual rents, according to market indexes have come down a lot more talking about inflation, not the actual level of rents. And so I don’t really take take this number too much to heart, I think that the downtrend is still very much intact for lower inflation. But it’s probably not going to be a straight line. And there could actually be some more setbacks along the way, depending on what goes on with shipping rates in the, in the Red Sea as a result of the the unsettled military situation.

James Connor 11:44
And what do you say to those people who say the CPI number is not a real number, and inflation is not running at 3.4%, or whatever the number is, and it’s significantly higher?

Ed Yardeni 11:56
Right? Well, I think that reflects people’s experience of going shopping. And they, and it wasn’t too long ago, that before the pandemic, they still remember what those prices were. And they know that a lot of prices have increased by 20 to 50%. Haven’t haven’t come down since pre pandemic pricing. And so they they, they kind of look at the level of the prices, were as economists, on the other hand, tend to look at the inflation rate, the the change in price inflation. And so when we say that inflation is coming down, that doesn’t mean that the price levels are coming down, it just means the rate at which prices are going up is slowing. That still hurts. I mean, if the prices now have increased dramatically. Now, the good news is that they’re increasing at a lower rate. That’s not good news for a lot of people. Most people don’t view that as good news other than economists and economists, you know, tend to live in their ivory towers, I guess. But, look, I think that the rate of inflation does matter to the to the bond market at the mat, matters to the Fed, it matters to how the Fed deals with with the economy and interest rates. So inflation doesn’t matter for monetary policy, that people are right. But they also have to factor in which economists do frequently is that okay, prices have gone up what have wages done, and we choose a lot of wages have actually kept up with inflation, not not all inflation, not not every components of inflation. But we have seen wage inflation picking up and now it looks like wage inflation is increasing faster than prices. In other words, real wages, inflation adjusted wages are going up. So there is some there is some comeback here for real wages. And that couldn’t possibly be happening consistently. Unless there was more productivity, which, again, is the heart of my story. And optimism is productivity is making a comeback.

James Connor 14:02
Yeah, you’re right. I believe I’ve read recently that there was over 20 major strikes in the US in 2023. A major strike being anything with over 1000 employees. Right. And of course, they all negotiated very aggressive packages. I remember. Yeah, I think it was UPS shocked by how much they’re getting paid today.

Ed Yardeni 14:23
Yeah, well, you know, certainly from their perspective, they could argue that we had a shock here in terms of how much more they have to pay, just just just to live. And, you know, and that maybe there was some need for them to catch up for not getting better pay increases over the past few years. But keep in mind that in the private sector, as unions accounted for about 6% of payroll employment in the private sector, back during the 1970s, which people Do worry about and see similarities with unions were about 35% of the of the labor force. So it’s true that they’re getting big increases. But they don’t add up as to as big an impact, a direct impact, but they’re, of course gonna be indirect impacts to the extent that people who aren’t in unions, you know, get a little bit more aggressive with their their employers to say, you know, I need to be paid more, we have seen people quit and increase their wages simply by going someplace else where they’re, they’re paying more.

James Connor 15:34
That’s an interesting point. And I just want to clarify that did you say 37% of the workforce in the 1970s? I

Ed Yardeni 15:42
think it’s the 35%. Yeah, there abouts, about about a third of the labor force was private sector. Labor Force was unionized. And now we’re down to 6%. So it’s quite quite, it’s quite a change. So

James Connor 15:54
what’s happened why such the such a change?

Ed Yardeni 15:59
Well, I think a lot of that had to do with the what so called deindustrialization, in the 1980s, we had a lot of competition from overseas from Japan, at first. And then when China joined the World Trade Organization, in 2001, we had even more competition from cheap labor overseas. And that really started to take take the juice out of the Union sector. But as you said, the union sector has made a comeback here. But they’re still relatively small compared to the size of the job market. And a lot of that, in the past, a lot of the jobs were in areas where we produce in manufacturing. And now, a lot of the jobs that are in services, and some of them certainly are unionized. And some some of those unions have been getting bigger pay increases, but unbalanced, the data shows that wage inflation has continued to moderate. Again, it’s the inflation rate that the level of wages wages, the level of wages has been going up, and now they’re going up faster than prices, which it’s not a matter of, you know, catching up, and whether they whether labor deserves it or not, it’s all a matter of productivity. If, if labor and, and management are able to work together to create a more productive economy, then people are gonna get paid more in inflation adjusted wages, which is what’s happening. It’s a win win situation for everybody.

James Connor 17:35
The other interesting thing, the CPI numbers, I was really surprised. It was 3.9% X food and energy and I understand the energies pulled back quite a bit, the price of oil is gone from 95 down to the low 77, the last few months of food, and oh man, that, you know, that number implies that the price of food has come down. And I don’t see that I was in Whole Foods recently. Yeah, I was gonna, I was going to get some beef tenderloin it was 40 bucks a pound. And so I opted for the flank steak.

Ed Yardeni 18:07
And the CPI really doesn’t capture that as well as the other measure of inflation that the Fed watches. And that’s the personal consumption expenditures deflator, which does in fact, capture switching, if people switch from, you know, expensive beef to cheaper chicken that consumption deflator will, will show that, and that will actually show up as a as a moderation in inflation with some adjustment. Whereas the CPI won’t want to just for how the shopping cart, how the basket of food changes.

James Connor 18:43
So another big component of CPI and just overall spinning is the price of oil. And you touched on this earlier. And given everything that’s going on in the world with geopolitics. I’m surprised it’s trading where it’s at, are you? No,

Ed Yardeni 18:58
I’m actually not because I look at things globally. And as you know, for the past couple of years, a lot of economists, a lot of strategists, were anticipating a recession, figuring that’s the only way to bring inflation down and that the Fed would have to raise interest rates to levels that cause a recession to bring inflation down. And I argue that well, you know, maybe the Chinese are going to do us a favor for a change. They’re going to have the recession. And they have been having a recession because their property bubble is burst. Their demography is terrible. This the geriatric population have referred to it as the world’s largest nursing home. So when I look at it from that perspective, China has been actually exporting a lot of deflation over the past year. So we’ve seen their prices coming down because of their recession. And we still import a lot from China. And that’s helped to keep a lid on pricing here. So one of the reasons that if inflation has come down so quickly is because goods inflation has come down now we’re just kind of waiting for renting inflation to come down more. Also, by the way, Europe is in a shallow recession right now, which also what takes pressure off of global demand. So you add it all together. And it adds up to a weak environment with demand for oil. Meanwhile, despite everything that Biden has said and about why he doesn’t like fossil fuels, the fact of the matter is oilfield production of is at an all time record high in the United States of 13 point 3 million barrels per day. And there’s just simply plenty of oil around Angola recently dropped out of OPEC, because they don’t want OPEC to impose restrictions on how much they can can export. So that’s been very helpful in terms of bringing inflation down, I watched the price of copper to just as important as oil, I think, because copper is particularly sensitive to what’s happens in China. But you know, we’ve seen mortgage rates come down in the US and some significant pickup and housing activity, housing starts. And you would think that that would really blow up the price of copper, but it hasn’t really moved much. And that’s because they’re not building anything, any apartments in China right now. So the demand for copper is weak in China more than offsetting, or at least offsetting the strength in the United States.

James Connor 21:17
And so I just want to clarify a couple of points, you said, you think the price of oil is low, because we’ve had a big pullback in China, and also a more subtle pullback in Europe.

Ed Yardeni 21:30
Correct. And there’s more supply, supply and demand was paid forward.

James Connor 21:36
And I think going into a presidential election, the US government’s probably happy with that.

Ed Yardeni 21:42
I think they’re happy with it, there’s not much they could do about it, they already kind of spent a good part of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve trying to make us all happy when Russia invaded Ukraine and try to kind of minimize the shock of oil prices going back. Going up back then. It’s debatable whether that was necessary or not. But the fact is, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve was brought down significantly, and now it has to be rebuilt. And even without potential. We’re seeing the price of well, quite weak.

James Connor 22:16
So let’s talk a little bit more about China, because it is the second largest economy in the world. And we had this big pullback in that economy. And I guess you could even say there’s a negative wealth effect there. But what do you think that’s

Ed Yardeni 22:32
the answer, very important point is that, you know, their stock market is down like 50% Over the past couple of years. And their property, their property is getting, you know, if you a lot of the Chinese bought apartments, as investments. And a lot of those apartments are don’t even earn rent, they’re just vacant. And now they’re seeing those the prices of those apartments going down. And even if they wanted to sell them, they’d have to sell them at a lower price. So I think it’s a very depressing development for the Chinese consumer.

James Connor 23:01
And of course, we can’t have a discussion on China without talking about Taiwan. And you’ve written quite a bit about this. What are your thoughts?

Ed Yardeni 23:08
Well, it’s, you know, that President President Xi of China has, over the past six months or so, fairly, repeatedly insisted that Taiwan is China, and that the Chinese government intends to bring Taiwan into the fold one way or the other. And I think it was recently on Mao was birthday, he wore a bow suit, and once again, reiterated that Taiwan is is China. And so it certainly sounds like the from a rhetoric rhetoric standpoint, he’s turning up the heat. But that, you know, the Chinese military has been playing cat and mouse with Taiwan by overflying some of the red lines on a fairly regular basis. So they’re, they could attack at any moment. But on the other hand, they know that whether economy is so fragile, the West would most likely respond the way they did to Russia, even though it hurt the West, because the West is much more dependent on China for all sorts of things. But it could could get kind of ugly if if the West responds to an invasion of Taiwan. So I think the Chinese government because of their weak economy, is going to hold off on any planned invasion. On the other hand, there is this theory that when things aren’t going well, in one’s economy and you’re a dictator, then why not start a war overseas and get all the nationalist fervor up and to blame everything that’s happening in your economy on foreigners? So it’s, it’s a dicey situation.

James Connor 24:52
Now you raise a very good point there, especially during the presidential election year. It was interesting to see President chi He come to San Francisco. I believe that was last month. And what do you think his objection objectives were?

Ed Yardeni 25:09
Well, I was panda diplomacy. I mean, in his speech, he said many times that he would like to see the the world a peaceful place where China and the United States work in partnership, for keeping global stability and all that. And he basically said, you know, if, if the US becomes less hostile towards China, because the US has a lot of complaints about the way China does business and does trade, said, You know, if the US just kind of simmers down, then he’ll send the paintings back. And he didn’t say that for sure. He said, Well, you know, we’ll, we’ll consider it. But as you know, the pandas, we’re, we’re, we’re here on loan, and they were sent back and she acknowledged that many Americans are would like to have the pandas come back, and for longer stay in visit? Oh, yeah, the the bottom line of it is he’s trying to he’s he’s, he’s trying to sweet talk, the situation. But at the end of the day, the the West is no longer being fooled by as many of China’s unfair practices. And things haven’t changed on the geopolitical front, quite the opposite, within building islands, in the South China Sea with them as starting up confrontations with some of their neighbors, whether it be the Vietnam or the Philippines. From, from a military standpoint, they, they certainly aren’t doing any sweet talk. And they’re quite the opposite. They’re being very threatening, particularly with regards to China.

James Connor 26:50
And I guess the path that the US is going to take with regard to China is has a lot to do with the upcoming elections. And why don’t you give us your thoughts there.

Ed Yardeni 27:03
But just one more thought on the China situation. And that is, I think that speech that he just gave in San Francisco is a indication of weakness, it’s an indication of concern about the domestic economy, because he was sitting there with it were an audience was full of American CEOs and, and other capitalists, basically ask them to invest in China, after he made, many of them believe because of the regulatory and supervisory supervision tightening that happened over there, where the Grant said the domestic elections. I am, I’m clueless. I mean, you know, hey, I right now, it looks like it’s going to be Biden versus Trump. I mean, it’s like, here we go again. And I think a lot of us would like a younger crowd that’s less partisan. And these two old guys, but look at my job isn’t to take sides in the domestic partisan debate, I have my own opinions. But I’ve often pointed out that when it comes to investing, you want to leave your politics out of the discussion, or your thought process, what you really need to do is think about how the policies and the consequences of these politics are going to have on the stock market, the bond market. And it’s been my observation over the years that isn’t it amazing how well the country’s done, how well the stock market’s done, in the face of all this meddling that’s coming out of Washington, all the other noises coming out of Washington. So I, I remain optimistic that despite Washington, the economy is going to continue to perform well, and that the stock market is going to continue to perform well. I point out to people look, you know, the headlines are all about what’s going on in Washington and fiscal policy, monetary policy. What doesn’t really make the news is that we, you know, working stiffs, get up in the morning, and go to work. Some of some of us are literally working stiffs working for somebody else. Some of us are working stiffs that are running things. But anyway, you look at it, we’re working hard, and we’re working hard to make things better for ourselves, our families, our communities, our country. And we do that despite the obstacles put in our way by folks in Washington and maybe some other parts of the country but unbalance we continue to make things better real GDP is at all time record high consumer spending all time record high consumer spending per household all time record. I mean, you can watch the news and get pretty depressed. You can listen to some of Wall Street strategists get pretty depressed. I’ve been on the more optimistic side. And so far that’s working out pretty well.

James Connor 30:04
I could not agree more. And you’re right at the end of the day, everybody wants the same thing. They just want a roof over their head food on the table and just to provide for their families. And I think, as you mentioned, millions of people in the US want to do that. And that’s why the US economy continues to do so well, in spite Hillary aspirate who’s in office.

Ed Yardeni 30:26
Yeah, Americans are very aspirational. I, I think they want more than just a roof. And food, I think they want a pool, I think they want a tennis court. It’s the aspirations that you know, people have, not all of them can achieve it. But you know, we’re seeing a lot of people going, traveling now some go and spend a lot of money others are able to take some Greek cruises with, with really good pricing. I haven’t entered the business. So give me a call if if you want a deal. But yeah, I think as pessimistic as people are, the the macroeconomic data shows that things have never been been better. And I get a lot of pushback on that. A lot of people say, you know, you obviously don’t go shopping or this and that, but I do go shopping. And I think I do have a realistic sense of what’s going on in the economy. And the stock market so far has validated my optimism.

James Connor 31:28
So you’re very bullish on the economy, very bullish on the markets overall. But if there was one thing that would change your view, what would it be? Well, I

Ed Yardeni 31:38
think we already discussed it. I think the the two scenarios that I anticipated, were sort of the alternative outlooks for the current decade. And I started talking about this in the 2020, with a pandemic. And increasingly, when we saw the inflation consequences of the pandemic and said, look, it’s either going to be the great inflation all over again, the great inflation, they call it the great inflation in the 1970s. But it actually started in the mid 60s when Johnson financed the Vietnam War, with deficit spending. And it really ended in the early 80s, when after Volcker increased interest rates dramatically, we were at Twin Peaks, and inflation because of the twin energy crises, labor unions were much more powerful. So when the price of gasoline went up dramatically, twice, that got passed through into wages very quickly, through cost of living adjustments. So so that’s one scenario. The other scenario is the roaring 2020s. It kind of rhymes with the roaring 1920s. And I think there are similarities, there’s differences. We had much more conservative presidents in the 1920s. And now I don’t know what we have right now. But I certainly wouldn’t describe it as anything comparable to the hands off laissez faire approach that we had in the 1920s. But again, when you kind of look beyond the politics and all that, what you see is during the 1920s, we had tremendous technological innovations that were very good at increasing productivity across a whole range of industries, and created a whole bunch of new products that consumers made consumers life better increased prosperity, washing machines, and electricity and, and plumbing, basic kinds of stuff. Now in the 2020s, we have, we’ll see how artificial intelligence comes along. I think there’s, I think it’s going to be an important technology. But I think there might be a little bit too much expectation short term. Meanwhile, we got plenty of innovations in automation and robotics. And so I think there’s enough going on that in technology that companies can use technology to increase productivity, and in fact, they have to, because there’s a shortage of labor, particularly skilled labor. So which is going to be is it going to be the great deflation of the 1970s? I’m not convinced to that. Now. I never really thought that was the most likely scenario. I’ve been in the roaring 2020s camp of feeling more comfortable with it of late. You know, when artificial intelligence kind of hit the media with Chad GPT that’s when the stock market really started. Taking off with the mega cap, eight, I call them mega cap eight. I just call them The Magnificent Seven. They started taking off. But I think we are already in a bull market that’s anticipating the roaring 2020s. You

James Connor 34:39
raised some very interesting points there. And I want to touch on the point you made about the 1970s in the oil embargo. And is a reminder to our viewers, the price of oil went from $3 a barrel to $11 a barrel in a very short period of time. If that were to happen now. Oh my god. Yeah, exactly. Match and go to the pumps and paying 205 X barrel. Yeah,

Ed Yardeni 35:02
well, you know that the Saudis and the Russians tried to push the price of oil back up to $100. During the summer, when they announced that they were cutting back production. And to my knowledge, they haven’t reversed that and said they’re going to increase their production. But instead of the price going up to 100, look where it is. Now, it’s substantially below that. So I think it just demonstrates supply and demand is what drives the price of oil and other commodities and market mechanism is working to the advantage of consumers, or at least, it’s not as easy to leave manipulated by the the OPEC countries is as they had hoped. And

James Connor 35:42
you have a very extensive library behind you. And I’m curious, what books are you reading right now? On the economy or any other subjects? Well,

Ed Yardeni 35:53
I do like, history books. And so right now, I’m looking at some of the books about the the 1920s kind of chapters from some of these histories. And, you know, just makes me feel more confident that in terms of the technological innovations, there’s there certainly there I mean, I’ve read some of the biographies of the so called the barons, the they call them the robber barons, but the reality is, the robber barons from the late 1800s, right into the 1920s. created all sorts of technologies, and products that increase the standard of living, John D. Rockefeller basically invented kerosene and gasoline, Ford basically popularized and made affordable the automobile. And, you know, Westinghouse electrified the country. So, there was tremendous innovations. And I think, you know, here we are in 2024. I mean, back in 2020 24, was the future, and it’s here now, and the question is, is it meaningfully better? And I think in many ways it is.

James Connor 37:19
Well, that that was a fascinating discussion. And if someone would like to learn more about you and the services that you offer, where can they go? Well,

Ed Yardeni 37:28
we created a research product for individual investors, about a year ago. It’s called Dr. Denny, yar D and Aiyar, Denny quick takes.com. So they could go there. Basically, the institutional product is available at your danny.com. Both are available on a trial basis, so they can have a look there.

James Connor 37:50
That’s great. And you’re also active on YouTube, which your YouTube channel?

Ed Yardeni 37:54
Yeah, I don’t even know. To tell you the truth. I think you just search me on YouTube. And I’ll be there. Well, that’s

James Connor 38:01
great. I want to thank you very much for spending time with us today. And I look forward to our next discussion.

Ed Yardeni 38:07
My pleasure, indeed. Thank you. Best, all the folks who tuned in.

James Connor 38:11
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